To be happy at home is the ultimate result of all ambition, the end to which every enterprise and labor tends, and of which every desire prompts the prosecution.

The disturbers of our happiness, in this world, are our desires, our griefs, and our fears.

Piety practiced in solitude, like the flower that blooms in the desert, may give its fragrance to the winds of heaven, and delight those unbodied spirits that survey the works of God and the actions of men; but it bestows no assistance upon earthly beings, and however free from taints of impurity, yet wants the sacred splendor of beneficence.

Every cold empirick, when his heart is expanded by a successful experiment, swells into a theorist.

Everybody loves to have things which please the palate put in their way, without trouble or preparation.

He that embarks on the voyage of life will always wish to advance rather by the impulse of the wind than the strokes of the oar; and many fold in their passage; while they lie waiting for the gale.

In sovereignty there are no gradations.