Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient.

There is none who does not lie hourly in the respect he pays to false appearance.

Poetry implies the whole truth. Philosophy expresses a particle of it.

Morning is when I am awake and there is a dawn in me.

We love to hear some men speak, though we hear not what they say; the very air they breathe is rich and perfumed, and the sound of their voices falls on the ear like the rustling of leaves or the crackling of the fire. They stand many deep.

Nature has left nothing to the mercy of man.

I seem to have dodged all my days with one or two persons, and lived upon expectation,--as if the bud would surely blossom; and soI am content to live.