We boast our emancipation from many superstitions; but if we have broken any idols, it is through a transfer of idolatry.

It is defeat which educates us.

To the body and mind which have been cramped by noxious work or company, nature is medicinal and restores their tone.

Marriage is the perfection which love aimed at, ignorant of what it sought.

The aid we can give each other is only incidental, lateral, and sympathetic.

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.

The Gothic cathedral is a blossoming in stone subdued by the insatiable demand of harmony in man.