At the age of twenty six I am in the condition of an aged person - all my old friends are gone... & my heart fails when I think by how few ties I hold to the world.

If the study to which you apply yourself has a tendency to weaken your affections and to destroy your taste for those simple pleasures in which no alloy can possibly mix, then that study is certainly unlawful, that is to say, not befitting the human mind.

Man," I cried, "how ignorant art thou in thy pride of wisdom!

The modern masters promise very little

Nothing contributes so much to tranquilize the mind as a steady purpose - a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye.

The agony of my feelings allowed me no respite; no incident occurred from which my rage and misery could not extract its food.

Satan has his companions, fellow-devils, to admire and encourage him; but I am solitary and detested.