We expect a great man to be a good reader.

There is a mortifying experience in particular, which does not fail to wreak itself also in the general history; I mean "the foolish face of praise," the forced smile which we put on in company where we do not feel at ease, in answer to conversation which does not interest us. The muscles, not spontaneously moved but moved, by a low usurping wilfulness, grow tight about the outline of the face, with the most disagreeable sensation.

There is also something excellent in every audience,--the capacity of virtue. They are ready to be beatified.

Go where he will, the wise man is at home, His hearth the earth, his hall the azure dome.

There are days when the great are near us, when there is no frown on their brow, no condescension even; when they take us by the hand, and we share their thought.

It is the same among the men and women, as among the silent trees; always a referred existence, an absence, never a presence and satisfaction. Is it, that beauty can never be grasped? In persons and in landscape is equally inaccessible?

For it is only the finite that has wrought and suffered; the infinite lies stretched in smiling repose.