No siren did ever so charm the ear of the listener as the listening ear has charmed the soul of the siren.

We figure to ourselves The thing we like; and then we build it up, As chance will have it, on the rock or sand,- For thought is tired of wandering o'er the world, And homebound Fancy runs her bark ashore.

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.

He who gives only what he would as readily throw away, gives without generosity; for the essence of generosity is in self-sacrifice.

There is no such test of a man's superiority of character as in the well-conducting of an unavoidable quarrel.

Fear, indeed, is the mother of foresight.

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.