How many years must a man do nothing, before he can at all know what is to be done and how to do it!

Were the eye not of the sun, How could we behold the light? If God's might and ours were not as one, How could His work enchant our sight?

Happy contractedness of youth, nay, of mankind in general, that they think neither of the high nor the deep, of the true nor the false, but only of what is suited to their own conceptions.

Every situation--nay, every moment--is of infinite worth; for it is the representative of a whole eternity.

Mysterious in the light of day, nature retains her veil, despite our clamours: That which she does not willingly display cannot be wrenched from her with levers, screws and hammers.

What men usually say of misfortunes, that they never come alone, may with equal truth be said of good fortune; nay, of other circumstances which gather round us in a harmonious way, whether it arise from a kind of fatality, or that man has the power of attracting to himself things that are mutually related.

We are our own aptest deceiver.