Some years ago - never mind how long precisely - having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world.

People think that if a man has undergone any hardship, he should have a reward; but for my part, if I have done the hardest possible day's work, and then come to sit down in a corner and eat my supper comfortably -why, then I don't think I deserve any reward for my hard day's work -for am I not now at peace? Is not my supper good?

Ignorance is the parent of fear.

Those of us who always abhorred slavery as an atheistical iniquity, gladly we join in the exulting chorus of humanity over its downfall.

Men there are, who having quite done with the world, all its merely worldly contents are become so far indifferent, that they carelittle of what mere worldly imprudence they may be guilty.

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

There is a wisdom that is woe; but there is a woe that is madness. And there is a Catskill eagle in some souls that can alike dive down into the blackest gorges, and soar out of them again and become invisible in the sunny spaces. And even if he for ever flies within the gorge, that gorge is in the mountains; so that even in his lowest swoop the mountain eagle is still higher than other birds upon the plain, even though they soar.