The counting-room maxims liberally expounded are laws of the Universe. The merchant's economy is a coarse symbol of the soul's economy. It is, to spend for power, and not for pleasure.

If two or three persons should come with a high spiritual aim and with great powers, the world would fall into their hands like a ripe peach.

We prize books, and they prize them most who are themselves wise.

I now require this of all pictures, that they domesticate me, not that they dazzle me. Pictures must not be too picturesque. Nothing astonishes men so much as common-sense and plain dealing. All great actions have been simple, and all great pictures are.

A low self-love in the parent desires that his child should repeat his character and fortune.

What you do thunders above your head so loudly, I cannot hear the words you speak.

Few people know how to take a walk. The qualifications are endurance, plain clothes, old shoes, an eye for nature, good humor, vast curiosity, good speech, good silence and nothing too much.