All round and round does the world lie as in a sharp-shooter's ambush, to pick off the beautiful illusions of youth, by the pitiless cracking rifles of the realities of age.

Personal prudence, even when dictated by quite other than selfish considerations, surely is no special virtue in a military man; while an excessive love of glory, impassioning a less burning impulse, the honest sense of duty, is the first.

It is not for man to follow the trail of truth too far, since by so doing he entirely loses the directing compass of his mind.

It is hard to be finite upon an infinite subject, and all subjects are infinite.

Is he mad? Anyway there's something on his mind, as sure as there must be something on a deck when it cracks.

Only the man who says no is free

In armies, navies, cities, or families, in nature herself, nothing more relaxes good order than misery.