Painting myself for others, I have painted my inward self with colors clearer than my original ones. I have no more made my book than my book has made me--a book consubstantial with its author, concerned with my own self, an integral part of my life; not concerned with some third-hand, extraneous purpose, like all other books.

Oh senseless man, who cannot possibly make a worm or a flea and yet will create Gods by the dozen!

Knowledge is an excellent drug; but no drug has virtue enough to preserve itself from corruption and decay, if the vessel be tainted and impure wherein it is put to keep.

Eloquence is an engine invented to manage and wield at will the fierce democracy, and, like medicine to the sick, is only employed in the paroxysms of a disordered state.

Poverty of goods is easily cured; poverty of soul, impossible.

Everything must not always be said, for that would be folly.

The most unhappy and frail creatures are men and yet they are the proudest.