Friendship is never established as an understood relation. It is a miracle which requires constant proofs. It is an exercise of the purest imagination and of the rarest faith!

A man must find his occasions in himself, it is true. The natural day is very calm, and will hardly reprove his indolence.

Really to see the sun rise or go down every day, so to relate ourselves to a universal fact, would preserve us sane forever.

Carlyle said that how to observe was to look, but I say that it is rather to see, and the more you look the less you will observe.

A man's real faith is never contained in his creed, nor is his creed an article of his faith. The last is never adopted. This it is that permits him to smile ever, and to live even as bravely as he does. And yet he clings anxiously to his creed, as to a straw, thinking that that does him good service because his sheet anchor does not drag.

The forests are held cheap after the white pine has been culled out; and the explorers and hunters pray for rain only to clear theatmosphere of smoke.

A traveler who looks at things with an impartial eye may see what the oldest inhabitant has not observed.