The great will not condescend to take anything seriously.

If you believe in fate, believe in it, at least, for your good.

The greatest man in history was the poorest.

A fly is as untamable as a hyena.

A certain awkwardness marks the use of borrowed thoughts; but as soon as we have learned what to do with them, they become our own.

Heaven often protects valuable souls charged with great secrets, great ideas, by long shutting them up with their own thoughts.

When life has been well spent, age is a loss of what it can well spare,--muscular strength, organic instincts, gross bulk, and works that belong to these. But the central wisdom, which was old in infancy, is young in fourscore years, and dropping off obstructions, leaves in happy subjects the mind purified and wise.