There's something ever egotistical in mountain-tops and towers, and all other grand and lofty things.

A beautiful woman is born Queen of men and women both, as Mary Stuart was born Queen of Scots, whether men or women.

We incline to think that God cannot explain His own secrets and that He would like a little information upon certain points Himself. We mortals astonish Him as much as He us. But it is this Being of the matter; there lies the knot with which we choke ourselves. As soon as you say Me, a God, a Nature, so soon you jump off from your stool and hang from the beam. Yes, that word is the hangman. Take God out of the dictionary, and you would have Him in the street.

Our souls are like those orphans whose unwedded mothers die in bearing them: the secret of our paternity lies in their grave, and we must there to learn it.

Surely a gentle sister is the second best gift to a man; and it is first in point of occurrence; for the wife comes after.

A chaplain is the minister of the Prince of Peace serving the host of the God of War--Mars. As such, he is as incongruous as a musket would be on the altar at Christmas. Why, then, is he there? Because he indirectly subserves the purpose attested by the cannon; because too he lends the sanction of the religion of the meek to that which practically is the abrogation of everything but brute Force.

Any appellative at all savouring of arbitrary rank is unsuitable to a man of liberal and catholic mind.