I am not yet so lost in lexicography, as to forget that words are the daughters of the earth, and that things are the sons of heaven. Language is only the instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas: I wish, however, that the instrument might be less apt to decay, and that signs might be permanent, like the things which they denote.

No member of a society has a right to teach any doctrine contrary to what the society holds to be true.

Being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned.

Every other author may aspire to praise; the lexicographer can only hope to escape reproach.

Grief is a species of idleness.

Leave to Heaven the measure and the choice.

Such is the common process of marriage. A youth and maiden exchange meeting by chance, or brought together by artifice, exchange glances, reciprocate civilities, go home, and dream of one another. Having little to divert attention, or diversify thought, they find themselves uneasy when they are apart, and therefore conclude that they shall be happy together. They marry, and discover what nothing but voluntary blindness had before concealed; they wear out life in altercations, and charge nature with cruelty.