Where there are large powers with little ambition... nature may be said to have fallen short of her purposes.

I have not skillFrom such a sharp and waspish word as "No"To pluck the sting.

The philosophy which affects to teach us a contempt of money does not run very deep; for, indeed, it ought to be still more clear to the philosopher than it is to ordinary men, that there are few things in the world of greater importance.

...and for that they were rich,/And robbed the poor; and for that they were strong,/And scourged the weak; and for that they made laws/Which turned the sweat of labor's brow to blood! - /For these their sins the nations cast them out.

A secret may be sometimes best kept by keeping the secret of its being a secret. It is not many years since a State secret of the greatest importance was printed without being divulged, merely by sending it to the press like any other matter, and trusting to the mechanical habits of the persons employed. They printed it piecemeal in ignorance of what it was about.

When you give, therefore, take to yourself no credit for generosity, unless you deny yourself something in order that you may give.

Of all the uses of adversity which are sweet, none are sweeter than those which grow out of disappointed love.