Learn taciturnity and let that be your motto!

Even every ray of hope destroyed and not a wish to gild the gloom.

Dare to be honest and fear no labor. ... Opera is where a man gets stabbed in the back, and instead of dying, he sings.

If there 's a hole in a' your coats, I rede ye tent it; A chiel 's amang ye takin' notes, And, faith, he 'll prent it.

Dweller in yon dungeon dark, Hangman of creation, mark! Who in widow weeds appears, Laden with unhonoured years, Noosing with care a bursting purse, Baited with many a deadly curse?

Great for good, or great for evil.

Good Lord, what is man! for as simple he looks, Do but try to develop his books and his crooks, With his depths and his shallows, his good and his evil, All in all, he's a problem must puzzle the devil.