Every passion gives a particular cast to the countenance, and is apt to discover itself in some feature or other. I have seen an eye curse for half an hour together, and an eyebrow call a man a scoundrel.

I have often thought, says Sir Roger, it happens very well that Christmas should fall out in the middle of Winter.

If I can in any way contribute to the Diversion or Improvement of the Country in which I live, I shall leave it, when I am summoned out of it, with the secret Satisfaction of thinking that I have not lived in vain.

Whether dark presages of the night proceed from any latent power of the soul during her abstraction, or from any operation of subordinate spirits, has been a dispute.

A statue lies hid in a block of marble, and the art of the statuary only clears away the superfluous matter and removes the rubbish. The figure is in the stone; the sculptor only finds it. What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to a human soul. The philosopher, the saint, or the hero,--the wise, the good, or the great man,--very often lies hid and concealed in a plebeian, which a proper education might have disinterred, and have brought to light.

It is of unspeakable advantage to possess our minds with an habitual good intention, and to aim all our thoughts, words, and actions at some laudable end.

Virgil has very finely touched upon the female passion for dress and shows, in the character of Camilla; who though she seems to have shaken off all the other weaknesses of her sex, is still described as a woman in this particular.