People that seem so glorious are all show; underneath they are like everyone else.

Do not speak of God much. After a very little conversation on the highest nature, thought deserts us and we run into formalism.

The dice of God are always loaded.

The best of life is conversation.

Things are pretty, graceful, rich, elegant, handsome, but, until they speak to the imagination, not yet beautiful.

Steam was till the other day the devil which we dreaded. Every pot made by any human potter or brazier had a hole in its cover, to let off the enemy, lest he should lift pot and roof and carry the house away.

We must learn the language of facts. The most wonderful inspirations die with their subject, if he has no hand to paint them to the senses.