None but those who have learned the art of subjecting their senses as well as reason to hypothetical systems can be persuaded by the most specious rhetorician that the lots of life are equal; yet it cannot be denied that every one has his peculiar pleasures and vexations, that external accidents operate variously upon different minds, and that no man can exactly judge from his own sensations what another would feel in the same circumstances.

In all pleasures hope is a considerable part.

A man is not obliged honestly to answer a question which should not properly be put.

Human happiness has always its abatements; the brightest sunshine of success is not without a cloud.

Friendship, like love, is destroyed by long absence, though it may be increased by short intermissions.

Pound St. Paul's Church into atoms, and consider any single atom; it is to be sure, good for nothing; but put all these atoms together, and you have St. Paul's Church. So it is with human felicity, which is made up of many ingredients, each of which may be shown to be very insignificant.

In his comic scenes, Shakespeare seems to produce, without labor, what no labor can improve.