The flowers of life are but visionary. How many pass away and leave no trace behind! How few yield any fruit,--and the fruit itself, how rarely does it ripen! And yet there are flowers enough; and is it not strange, my friend, that we should suffer the little that does really ripen to rot, decay, and perish unenjoyed?

Just as, out of habit, one consults a run-down clock as though it were still going, so too one may look at the face of a beautiful woman as though he still loved her.

Let's plunge ourselves into the roar of time, the whirl of accident; may pain and pleasure, success and failure, shift as they will -- it's only action that can make a man.

Always to distrust is an error, as well as always to trust.

I will listen to anyone's convictions, but pray keep your doubts to yourself.

Humor is one of the elements of genius--admirable as an adjunct; but as soon as it becomes dominant, only a surrogate for genius.

If you are to accomplish all that one demands of you, you must overestimate your own worth.