Nature is a frugal mother, and never gives without measure. When she has work to do, she qualifies men for that and sends them equipped.

Silence is a solvent that destroys personality, and gives us leave to be great and universal.

The life of man is the true romance, which when it is valiantly conduced, will yield the imagination a higher joy than any fiction.

Repose and cheerfulness are the badge of the gentleman - repose in energy. The Greek battle pieces are calm; the heroes, in whatever violent actions engaged, retain a serene aspect.

Man is a shrewd inventor, and is ever taking the hint of a new machine from his own structure, adapting some secret of his own anatomy in iron, wood, and leather, to some required function in the work of the world.

Meek young men grow up in libraries, believing it their duty to accept the views which Cicero, which Locke, which Bacon, have given, forgetful that Cicero, Locke, and Bacon were only young men in libraries, when they wrote these books.

Coal is a portable climate.