Character is always known. Thefts never enrich; alms never impoverish; murder will speak out of stone walls.

Men grind and grind in the mill of a truism, and nothing comes out but what was put in. But the moment they desert the tradition for a spontaneous thought, then poetry, wit, hope, virtue, learning, anecdote, and all flock to their aid.

Society is a masked ball, where every one hides his real character, and reveals it by hiding.

By necessity, by proclivity, and by delight, we all quote. In fact, it is as difficult to appropriate the thoughts of others as it is to invent.

Our poets are men of talents who sing, and not the children of music.

The eloquent man is he who is no beautiful speaker, but who is inwardly and desperately drunk with a certain belief.

Children and savages use only nouns or names of things, which they convert into verbs, and apply to analogous mental acts.