The Church seems to totter to its fall, almost all life extinct. On this occasion, any complaisance would be criminal which told you, whose hope and commission it is to preach the faith of Christ, that the faith of Christ is preached.

The art of sculpture is long ago perished to any real effect... it is the game of a rude and youthful people, and not the manly labour of a wise and spiritual nation.

The man, who has seen the rising moon break out of the clouds at midnight, has been present like an archangel at the creation of light and of the world.

Besides the general infusion of wit to heighten civility, the direct splendor of intellectual power is ever welcome in fine society, as the costliest addition to its rule and its credit.

We surround ourselves with the true image of ourselves.

What I must do is all that concerns me, not what people think. This rule,equally arduous in actual and intellectual life, may serve for the whole distinction between greatness and meanness. It is the harder, because you will always find those who think they know what is your duty better than you know it. It is easy in the world to live after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.

General ideas are essences. They are our gods: they round and ennoble the most partial and sordid way of living.