It is not always the highest talent that thrives best. Mediocrity, with tact, will outweigh talent oftentimes.

A thinker is a person.

Do you know a book that you are willing to put under your head for a pillow when you lie dying? Very well; that is the book you want to study while you are living. There is but one such book in the world.

So many people glorify and romanticize 'busy.' I do not. I value purpose. I believe in resting in reason and moving in passion. If you’re always busy/moving, you will miss important details. I like the mountain. Still, but when it moves, lands shift and earth quakes.

Pillow my head on no guesses when I die.

Safe popular freedom consists of four things, the diffusion of liberty, of intelligence, of property, and of conscientiousness, and cannot be compounded of any three out of the four.

Only the home can found a state.