It is handsomer to remain in the establishment better than the establishment, and conduct that in the best manner, than to make asally against evil by some single improvement, without supporting it by a total regeneration.

But the mark of American merit in painting, in sculpture, in poetry, in fiction, in eloquence, seems to be a certain grace withoutgrandeur, and itself not new but derivative; a vase of fair outline, but empty,--which whoso sees, may fill with what wit and character is in him, but which does not, like the charged cloud, overflow with terrible beauty, and emit lightnings on all beholders.

Works of the intellect are great only by comparison with each other.

No man has a right perception of any truth, who has not been reacted on by it, so as to be ready to be its martyr.

The True Artist has the planet for his pedestal; the adventurer, after years of strife, has nothing broader than his shoes.

The eyes indicate the antiquity of the soul.

A man in a cave or in a camp, a nomad, will die with no more estate than the wolf or the horse leaves.