Many leave the labours of half their life to their executors and to chance, because they will not send them abroad unfinished, and are unable to finish them, having prescribed to themselves such a degree of exactness as human diligence can scarcely ontain.

Composition is for the most part an effort of slow diligence and steady perseverance, to which the mind is dragged by necessity or resolution, and from which the attention is every moment starting to more delightful amusements.

In proportion as our cares are employed upon the future, they are abstracted from the present, from the only time which we can call our own, and of which, if we neglect the apparent duties to make provision against visionary attacks, we shall certainly counteract our own purpose.

There is always something a woman will prefer to the truth.

A gentleman who had been very unhappy in marriage, married immediately after his wife died; it was the triumph of hope over experience.

Luncheon: as much food as one's hand can hold.

He that thinks he can afford to be negligent is not far from being poor.