A dilettantism in nature is barren and unworthy. A fop of fields is no better than his brother on Broadway.

The rage for road building is beneficent for America, where vast distance is so main a consideration in our domestic politics andtrade, inasmuch as the great political promise of the invention is to hold the Union staunch, whose days already seem numbered by the mere inconvenience of transporting representatives, judges and officers across such tedious distances of land and water.

Cannot we let [children] be themselves, and enjoy life in their own way? You are trying to make another you. One's enough.

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

As every man is hunted by his own daemon, vexed by his own disease, this checks all his activity.

No sensible person ever made an apology.

The never-ending task of self improvement.