It is a very good world for the purposes for which it was built; and that is all anything is good for.

True elegance becomes the more so as it approaches simplicity.

There is no faculty of the human soul so persistent and universal as that of hatred.

Are they dead that yet speak louder than we can speak, and a more universal language? Are they dead that yet act? Are they dead that yet move upon society and inspire the people with nobler motives and more heroic patriotism?

Sorrows are gardeners: they plant flowers along waste places, and teach vines to cover barren heaps.

Men think God is destroying them because he is tuning them. The violinist screws up the key till the tense cord sounds the concert pitch; but it is not to break it, but to use it tunefully, that he stretches the string upon the musical rack.

There are some men's souls that are so thin, so almost destitute of what is the true idea of soul, that were not the guardian angels so keen-sighted, they would altogether overlook them.