Scarcely any degree of judgment is sufficient to restrain the imagination from magnifying that on which it is long detained

When emulation leads us to strive for self-elevation by merit alone, and not by belittling another, then it is one of the grandest possible incentives to action.

Vanity is so frequently the apparent motive of advice, that we, for the most part, summon our powers to oppose it without any very accurate inquiry whether it is right.

It seems not more reasonable to leave the right of printing unrestrained, because writers may be afterwards censured, than it would be to sleep with doors unbolted, because by our laws we can hang a thief.

There is less flogging in our great schools than formerly-but then less is learned there; so what the boys get at one end they lose at the other.

As a madman is apt to think himself grown suddenly great, so he that grows suddenly great is apt to borrow a little from the madman.

People in general do not willingly read if they have anything else to amuse them.