The eye is the first circle; the horizon which it forms is the second; and throughout nature this primary figure is repeated without end.

Behind us, as we go, all things assume pleasing forms, as clouds do far off. Not only things familiar and stale, but even the tragic and terrible, are comely, as they take their place in the pictures of memory.

An action is the perfection and publication of thought. A right action seems to fill the eye, and to be related to all nature.

But there are higher secrets of culture, which are not for the apprentices, but for proficients. These are lessons only for the brave. We must know our friends under ugly masks. The calamities are our friends.

Skepticism is unbelief in cause and effect.

Fate, then, is a name for facts not yet passed under the fire of thought; for causes which are unpenetrated.

We do not live an equal life, but one of contrasts and patchwork; now a little joy, then a sorrow, now a sin, then a generous or brave action.