Prayer should be short, without giving God Almighty reasons why He should grant this or that; He knows best wheat is good for us. If your boy should ask you for a suit of clothes and give you reasons, would you endure it? You know his needs better than he; let him ask for a suit of clothes.

If the prisoner should ask the judge whether he would be content to be hanged, were he in his case, he would answer no. Then, says the prisoner, do as you would be done to.

Pride may be allowed to this or that degree, else a man cannot keep up dignity. In gluttony there must be eating, in drunkenness there must be drinking; 'tis not the eating, and 'tis not the drinking that must be blamed, but the excess. So in pride.

Idolatry is in a man's own thought, not in the opinion of another.

Abundance consists not alone in material possession, but in an uncovetous spirit.

Philosophy is nothing but discretion.

Opinion is something wherein I go about to give reasons why all the world should think as I think.