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

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.

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

Wisdom is corrupted by ambition, even when the quality of the ambition is intellectual. For ambition, even of this quality, is but a form of self-love.

His foodWas glory, which was poison to his mindAnd peril to his body.

Shy and unready men are great betrayers of secrets, for there are few wants more urgent for the moment than the want of something to say.

Fear, indeed, is the mother of foresight.