This American government - what is it but a tradition, though a recent one, endeavoring to transmit itself unimpaired to posterity, but each instant losing some of its integrity? It has not the vitality and force of a single living man; for a single man can bend it to his will.

When the farmer has got his house, he may not be the richer but the poorer for it, and it be the house that has got him... a man is rich in proportion to the number of things which he can afford to let alone.

Since all things are good, men fail at last to distinguish which is the bane and which the antidote.

The science of Humboldt is one thing, poetry is another thing. The poet to-day, notwithstanding all the discoveries of science, and the accumulated learning of mankind, enjoys no advantage over Homer.

The most primitive places left with us are the swamps, where the spruce still grows shaggy with usnea.

When you knock, ask to see God — none of the servants.

The secret of achievement is to hold a picture of a successful outcome in mind.