The next best thing to knowing something is knowing where to find it.

We must consider how very little history there is--I mean real, authentic history. That certain kings reigned and certain battles were fought, we can depend upon as true; but all the coloring, all the philosophy, of history is conjecture.

It is generally allowed, that no man ever found the happiness of possession proportionate to that expectation which incited his desire, and invigorated his pursuit; nor has any man found the evils of life so formidable in reality, as they were described to him by his own imagination; every species of distress brings with it some peculiar supports, some unforeseen means of resisting, or powers of enduring.

Every man wishes to be wise, and they who cannot be wise are almost always cunning.

There is no kind of idleness by which we are so easily seduced as that which dignifies itself by the appearance of business.

The only end of writing is to enable readers better to enjoy life or better to endure it.

Learn that the present hour alone is man's.