The greatest firmness is the greatest mercy.

Simplicity is the character of the spring of life, costliness becomes its autumn; but a neatness and purity, like that of the snow-drop or lily of the valley, is the peculiar fascination of beauty, to which it lends enchantment, and gives what amiability is to the mind.

I have you fast in my fortress, And will not let you depart, But put you down into the dungeon, In the round-tower of my heart, And there will I keep you forever, Yes, forever and a day, Till the walls shall crumble to ruin, And moulder in the dust away!

How wonderful is the human voice! It is indeed the organ of the soul. The intellect of man is enthroned visibly on his forehead and in his eye, and the heart of man is written on his countenance, but the soul, the soul reveals itself in the voice only.

A spirit of criticism, if indulged in, leads to a censoriousness of disposition that is destructive of all nobler feeling. The man who lives to find faults has a miserable mission.

Morality without religion is only a kind of dead reckoning - an endeavor to find our place on a cloudy sea by measuring the distance we have run, but without any observation of the heavenly bodies.

He that respects himself is safe from others. He wears a coat of mail that none can pierce.