Some of our weaknesses are born in us, others are the result of education; it is a question which of the two gives us most trouble.

What is part of you, you cannot get rid of, even if you were to throw it away.

One is never satisfied with the portrait of a person that one knows.

Do not hurry; do not rest.

There are but few who have ideas and are, at the same time, capable of action. Ideas enlarge but stymie, action enlivens but confines.

I let everyone follow his own bent, that I may be free to follow mine.

As for solitude, I cannot understand how certain people seek to lay claim to intellectual stature, nobility of soul and strength of character, yet have not the slightest feeling for seclusion; for solitude, I maintain, when joined with a quiet contemplation of nature, a serene and conscious faith in creation and the Creator, and a few vexations from outside is the only school for a mind of lofty endowment.