Devotion, when it does not lie under the check of reason, is apt to degenerate into enthusiasm.

It is impossible for us, who live in the latter ages of the world, to make observations in criticism, morality, or in any art or science, which have not been touched upon by others. We have little else left us but to represent the common sense of mankind in more strong, more beautiful, or more uncommon lights.

Good nature will always supply the absence of beauty; but beauty cannot supply the absence of good nature.

Music, among those who were styled the chosen people, was a religious art.

We are always doing something for posterity, but I would fain see posterity do something for us.

There is nothing that more betrays a base ungenerous spirit than the giving of secret stabs to a man's reputation. Lampoons and satires that are written with wit and spirit are like poisoned darts, which not only inflict a wound, but make it incurable.

One of the most important but one of the most difficult things for a powerful mind is to be its own master.