...the person that had took a bull by the tail once had learnt sixty or seventy times as much as a person that hadn't, and said a person that started in to carry a cat home by the tail was getting knowledge that was always going to be useful to him, and warn't ever going to grow dim or doubtful. Chances are, he isn't likely to carry the cat that way again, either. But if he wants to, I say let him!

Switzerland is simply a large, lumpy, solid rock with a thin skin of grass stretched over it.

Trial by jury is the palladium of our liberties. I do not know what a palladium is, but I am sure it is a good thing!

It usually takes me more than three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech.

You have noticed that the human being is a curiosity. In times past he has had (and worn out and flung away) hundreds and hundreds of religions; today he has hundreds and hundreds of religions, and launches not fewer than three new ones every year. I could enlarge on that number and still be within the facts.

The soul and substance of what customarily ranks as patriotism is moral cowardice -- and always has been.

I am able to say that while I am not ruggedly well, I am not ill enough to excite an undertaker.