Any sincere thought is irresistible.

Nature would not appear so rich, the profusion so rich, if we knew a use for everything.

We commonly do not remember that it is, after all, always the first person that is speaking.

Commonly men will only be brave as their fathers were brave, or timid.

Fame itself is but an epitaph; as late, as false, as true.

Still we live meanly, like ants; though the fable tells us that we were long ago changed into men; like pygmies we fight with cranes; it is error upon error, and clout upon clout, and our best virtue has for its occasion a superfluous and evitable wretchedness. Our life is frittered away by detail.

Let a man take time enough for the most trivial deed, though it be but the paring of his nails. The buds swell imperceptibly, without hurry or confusion,--as if the short spring days were an eternity.