The experience of all former ages had shown that of all human governments, democracy was the most unstable, fluctuating and short-lived.

The laws of man may bind him in chains or may put him to death, but they never can make him wise, virtuous, or happy.

Find a mission that you can give yourself over to and then spend your days moving that mission forward. Man is made so that when anything fires his soul the impossibilities vanish. The influence of each human being on others in this life is a kind of immortality.

America is a friend of freedom everywhere, but a custodian only of our own.

This is the last of earth! I am content.

I want a warm and faithful friend, To cheer the adverse hour; Who ne'er to flatter will descend, Nor bend the knee to power,- A friend to chide me when I'm wrong, My inmost soul to see; And that my friendship prove as strong For him as his for me.

The harmony of the nation is promoted and the whole Union is knit together by the sentiments of mutual respect, the habits of social intercourse, and the ties of personal friendship formed between the representatives of its several parts in the performance of their service at this metropolis.