We are shut up in school and college recitation rooms for ten to fifteen years, and come out at last with a bellyful of words and do not know a thing. We cannot use our hands, or our legs, or our eyes, or our arms. We do not know an edible root in the woods. We cannot tell our course by the stars, nor the hour of day by the sun. It is well if we can swim and skate. We are afraid of a horse or a cow, of a dog, of a cat, of a spider. Far better was the Roman rule to teach a boy nothing that he could not learn standing.

The life of labor does not make men, but drudges.

There is no event greater in life than the appearance of new persons about our hearth, except it be the progress of the characterwhich draws them.

Every man in his lifetime needs to thank his faults.

The judge weighs the arguments and puts a brave face on the matter, and since there must be a decision, decides as he can, and hopes he has done justice and given satisfaction to the community

These are the voices which we hear in solitude, but they grow faint and inaudible as we enter into the world. Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of everyone of its members. Society is a joint-stock company, in which the members agree, for the better securing of his bread to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty and culture of the eater. The virtue in most request is conformity. Self-reliance is its aversion. It loves not realities and creators, but names and customs.

Marriage (in what is called the spiritual world) is impossible, because of the inequality between every subject and every object.