Let not a man guard his dignity, but let his dignity guard him.

Our impatience of miles, when we are in a hurry; but it is still best that a mile should have seventeen hundred and sixty yards.

That which we do not believe, we cannot adequately say; even though we may repeat the words ever so often.

The secret of ugliness consists not in irregularity, but in being uninteresting.

There is no country in which so absolute a homage is paid to wealth. In America there is a touch of shame when a man exhibits theevidences of large property, as if after all it needed apology. But the Englishman has pure pride in his wealth, and esteems it a final certificate. A coarse logic rules throughout all English souls: if you have merit, can you not show it by your good clothes and coach and horses?

A man must thank his defects, and stand in some terror of his talents.

The men who carry their points do not need to inquire of their constituents what they should say, but are themselves the country which they represent: nowhere are its emotions or opinions so instant and so true as in them; nowhere so pure from a selfish infusion.