Our first mistake is the belief that the circumstance gives the joy which we give to the circumstance.

Why should we grope among the dry bones of the past, or put the living generation into masquerade out of its faded wardrobe?

What king has he not taught state, as Talma taught Napoleon? What maiden has not found him finer than her delicacy? What lover has he not outloved? What sage has he not outseen? What gentleman has he not instructed in the rudeness of his behavior?

All the great ages have been ages of belief.

What I must do is all that concerns me, not what the people think.

Every man's condition is a solution in hieroglyph to those inquiries he would put. He acts it as life before he apprehends it as truth.

The wise man in the storm prays God not for safety from danger but for deliverance from fear. It is the storm within which endangers him[,] not the storm without.