I cannot find a faithful message-bearer," he wrote to his friend, the scholar Atticus. "How few are they who are able to carry a rather weighty letter without lightening it by reading.

Though liberty is established by law, we must be vigilant, for liberty to enslave us is always present under that very liberty. Our Constitution speaks of the "general welfare of the people." Under that phrase all sorts of excesses can be employed by lusting tyrants to make us bondsmen.

For my own part, I had rather be old only a short time than be old before I really am so.

It has seemed to be more necessary to have regard to the weight of words rather than to their number.

Every man can tell how many goats or sheep he possesses, but not how many friends.

Orators are most vehement when they have the weakest cause, as men get on horseback when they cannot walk.

So it may well be believed that when I found him taking a complete holiday, with a vast supply of books at command, he had the air of indulging in a literary debauch, if the term may be applied to so honorable an occupation.