We must not inquire too curiously into the absolute value of literature. Enough that it amuses and exercises us. At least it leaves us where we were. It names things, but does not add things.

Wit makes its own welcome, and levels all distinctions.

Concentration is the secret of srength.

...man is an analogist, and studies relations in all objects. He is placed in the center of beings, and a ray of relation passes from every other being to him. And neither can man be understood without these objects, nor these objects without man.

I could better eat with one who did not respect the truth or the laws, than with a sloven and unpresentable person. Moral qualities rule the world, but at shorter distances, the senses are despotic.

The babe in arms is a channel through which the energies we call fate, love, and reason visibly stream.

All loss, all pain, is particular; the universe remains to the heart unhurt.