I have a respect for family pride. If it be a prejudice, it is a prejudice in its most picturesque shape. But I hold it is connected with some of the noblest feelings in our nature.

I think hearts are very much like glasses. If they do not break with the first ring, they usually last a considerable time.

It is strange what society will endure from its idols.

No thoroughly occupied man was ever yet very miserable.

Enthusiasm is the divine particle in our composition: with it we are great, generous, and true; without it, we are little, false, and mean.

I cannot see why a taste for the country should be held so very indispensable a requisite for excellence; but really people talk of it as if it were a virtue, and as if an opposite opinion was, to say the least of it, very immoral.

English people ... never speak, excepting in cases of fire or murder, unless they are introduced.