The world, which the Greeks called Beauty, has been made such by being gradually divested of every ornament which was not fitted to endure.

When I go out of the house for a walk, uncertain as yet whither I will bend my steps, [I] submit myself to my instinct to decide for me.

The kind uncles and aunts of the race are more esteemed than its true spiritual fathers and mothers.

It is not so important that many should be good as you, as that there be some absolute goodness somewhere; for that will leaven the whole lump.

Every man must walk to the beat of his own drummer.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison, the only house in a slave State in which a free man can abide with honor. They do not know how much truth is stronger than error, nor how much more eloquently and effectively he can combat injustice who has experienced a little in his own person. If the alternative is to keep all just men in prison, or give up war and slavery, the State will not hesitate which to choose.

Men go back to the mountains, as they go back to sailing ships at sea, because in the mountains and on the sea they must face up.