We cannot live on probabilities. The faith in which we can live bravely and die in peace must be a certainty, so far as it professes to be a faith at all, or it is nothing.

To be happy is not the purpose for which you are placed in this world.

The best that we can do for one another is to exchange our thoughts freely; and that, after all, is about all.

Courage is, on all hands, considered as an essential of high character.

The solitary side of our nature demands leisure for reflection upon subjects on which the dash and whirl of daily business, so long as its clouds rise thick about us, forbid the intellect to fasten itself.

The essence of greatness is neglect of the self.

Science rests on reason and experiment, and can meet an opponent with calmness; [but] a creed is always sensitive.