Giving comfort under affliction requires that penetration into the human mind, joined to that experience which knows how to soothe, how to reason, and how to ridicule; taking the utmost care never to apply those arts improperly.

As a conquered rebellion strengthens a government, or as health is more perfectly established by recovery from some diseases; so anger, when removed, often gives new life to affection.

It is not enough that your designs, nay that your actions, are intrinsically good, you must take care they shall appear so.

There is perhaps no surer mark of folly, than to attempt to correct natural infirmities of those we love.

We are as liable to be corrupted by books, as by companions.

No one hath seen beauty in its highest lustre who hath never seen it in distress.

Domestic happiness is the end of almost all our pursuits, and the common reward of all our pains. When men find themselves forever barred from this delightful fruition, they are lost to all industry, and grow careless of all their worldly affairs. Thus they become bad subjects, bad relations, bad friends, and bad men.