Passions, as fire and water, are good servants, but bad masters, and subminister to the best and worst purposes.

We never think of the main business of life till a vain repentance minds us of it at the wrong end.

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.

Humor is the offspring of man; it comes forth like Minerva, fully armed from the brain.

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 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.

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.