History, like love, is so apt to surround her heroes with an atmosphere of imaginary brightness.

All greatness of character is dependent on individuality. The man who has no other existence than that which he partakes in common with all around him, will never have any other than an existence of mediocrity.

Near the centre of that State of New York lies an extensive district of country, whose surface is a succession of hills and dales, or, to speak with greater deference to geographical definitions, of mountains and valleys.

It is the fate of all things to ripen, and then to decay.

Individuality is the aim of political liberty.

Property is desirable as the ground work of moral independence, as a means of improving the faculties, and of doing good to others, and as the agent in all that distinguishes the civilized man from the savage.

When men struggle for the single life God has given them ... even their own kind seem no more than the beasts of the wood.