No nation can last which has made a mob of itself, however generous at heart.

There is large difference between indolent impatience of labor and intellectual impatience of delay, large difference between leaving things unfinished because we have more to do or because we are satisfied with what we have done.

Though you may have known clever men who were indolent, you never knew a great man who was so; and when I hear a young man spoken of as giving promise of great genius, the first question I ask about him always is, Does he work?

It is a good and safe rule to sojourn in every place as if you meant to spend your life there, never omitting an opportunity of doing a kindness, or speaking a true word, or making a friend.

Nature is always mysterious and secret in her use of means; and art is always likest her when it is most inexplicable.

Modern education has devoted itself to the teaching of impudence, and then we complain that we can no longer control our mobs.

It is not how much one makes but to what purpose one spends.