Falsehood is difficult to be maintained. When the materials of a building are solid blocks of stone, very rude architecture will suffice; but a structure of rotten materials needs the most careful adjustment to make it stand at all.

If all our wishes were gratified, most of our pleasures would be destroyed.

Falsehood, like the dry-rot, flourishes the more in proportion as air and light are excluded.

As one may bring himself to believe almost anything he is inclined to believe, it makes all the difference whether we begin or end with the inquiry, 'What is truth?'

A certain class of novels may with propriety be called fables.

Controversy, though always an evil in itself, is sometimes a necessary evil.

The love of admiration leads to fraud, much more than the love of commendation; but, on the other hand, the latter is much more likely to spoil our: good actions by the substitution of an inferior motive.