Wise men are not wise at all hours, and will speak five times from their taste or their humor, to once from their reason.

Meantime the education of the general mind never stops. The reveries of the true and simple are prophetic. What the tender poeticyouth dreams, and prays, and paints today, but shuns the ridicule of saying aloud, shall presently be the resolutions of public bodies, then shall be carried as grievance and bill of rights through conflict and war, and then shall be triumphant law and establishment for a hundred years, until it gives place, in turn, to new prayers and pictures.

The common experience is, that the man fits himself as well as he can to the customary details of that work or trade he falls into, and tends it as a dog turns a spit. Then he is part of the machine he moves; the man is lost.

Conversation is an art in which a man has all mankind for his competitors, for it is that which all are practising every day while they live.

Character is higher than intellect... A great soul will be strong to live, as well as strong to think.

In the order of nature, we cannot render benefits to those from whom we receive them, or only seldom. But the benefit we receive must be rendered again, line for line, deed for deed, cent for cent, to somebody. Beware of too much good staying in your hand. It will fast corrupt and worm worms. Pay it away quickly in some sort.

A man finds room in the few square inches of the face for the traits of all his ancestors; for the expression of all his history, and his wants.