To follow imperfect, uncertain, or corrupted traditions, in order to avoid erring in our own judgment, is but to exchange one danger for another.

Of all hostile feelings, envy is perhaps the hardest to be subdued, because hardly any one owns it even to himself, but looks out for one pretext after another to justify his hostility.

It is an awful, an appalling thought, that we may be, this moment and every moment, in the presence of malignant spirits.

It is the neglect of timely repair that makes rebuilding necessary.

Geologists complain that when they want specimens of the common rocks of a country, they receive curious spars; just so, historians give us the extraordinary events and omit just what we want,--the every-day life of each particular time and country.

To know your ruling passion, examine your castles in the air.

Woman is like the reed which bends to every breeze, but breaks not in the tempest.