Would Time but await the close of our favorite follies, we should all be young men, all of us, and until Doom's Day.

Most people are so constituted that they can only be virtuous in a certain routine; an irregular course of life demoralizes them.

Death was too definite an object to be wished for or avoided.

If truth were everywhere to be shown, a scarlet letter would blaze forth on many a bosom.

There is evil in every human heart, which may remain latent, perhaps, through the whole of life; but circumstances may rouse it to activity.

It will startle you to see what slaves we are to by-gone times-to Death, if we give the matter the right word! ... We read in Dead Men's books! We laugh at Dead Men's jokes, and cry at Dead Men's pathos! . . . Whatever we seek to do, of our own free motion, a Dead Man's icy hand obstructs us!

Let the black flower blossom as it may!