Learn to shrink yourself to the size of the company you are in. Take their tone, whatever it may be, and excell in it if you can;but never pretend to give the tone. A free conversation will no more bear a dictator than a free government will.

I look upon indolence as a sort of suicide.

Patience is the most necessary quality for business, many a man would rather you heard his story than grant his request.

I sometimes give myself admirable advice, but I am incapable of taking it.

Let your letter be written as accurately as you are able,--I mean with regard to language, grammar, and stops; for as to the matter of it the less trouble you give yourself the better it will be. Letters should be easy and natural, and convey to the persons to whom we send them just what we should say to the persons if we were with them.

Singularity is only pardonable in old age and retirement; I may now be as singular as I please, but you may not.

He adorned whatever subject he either spoke or wrote upon, by the most splendid eloquence.