Those who have ruled human destinies, like planets, for thousands of years, were not handsome men.

With each divine impulse the mind rends the thin rinds of the visible and finite, and comes out into eternity, and inspires and expires its air. It converses with truths that have always been spoken in the world, and becomes conscious of a closer sympathy with Zeno and Arrian, than with persons in the house.

The populace drags down the gods to their own level.

Each man has his own vocation; his talent is his call. There is one direction in which all space is open to him.

When you have worn out yourshoes, the strength of the shoe leather has passed into the fiber ofyour body. I measure your health by the number of shoes and hats andclothes you have worn out.

Society never advances. It recedes as fast on one side as it gains on the other. Society acquires new arts, and loses old instincts.

Science is nothing but the finding of analogy, identity, in the most remote parts.