If we should cease to be generous and charitable because another is sordid and ungrateful, it would be much in the power of vice to extinguish Christian virtues.

Of all injustice, that is the greatest which goes under the name of law, and of all sorts of tyranny the forcing of the letter of the law against the equity, is the most insupportable.

Figure-flingers and star-gazers pretend to foretell the fortunes of kingdoms, and have no foresight in what concerns themselves.

Men talk as if they believed in God, but they live as if they thought there was none; their vows and promises are no more than words, of course.

By one delay after another they spin out their whole lives, till there's no more future left for them.

Some read books only with a view to find fault, while others read only to be taught; the former are like venomous spiders, extracting a poisonous quality, where the latter, like the bees, sip out a sweet and profitable juice.

Men are not to be judged by their looks, habits, and appearances; but by the character of their lives and conversations, and by their works.