How small of all that human hearts endure, That part which laws or kings can cause or cure! Still to ourselves in every place consigned, Our own felicity we make or find. With secret course, which no loud storms annoy, Glides the smooth current of domestic joy.

It is more reasonable to wish for reputation while it may be enjoyed, as Anacreon calls upon his companions to give him for present use the wine and garlands which they propose to bestow upon his tomb.

Some desire is necessary to keep life in motion.

Sorrow is properly that state of the mind in which our desires are fixed upon the past without looking forward to the future.

They whose activity of imagination is often shifting the scenes of expectation, are frequently subject to such sallies of caprice as make all their actions fortuitous, destroy the value of their friendship, obstruct the efficacy of their virtues, and set them below the meanest of those who persist in their resolutions, execute what they design, and perform what they have promised.

The greatest part of a writer's time is spent in reading in order to write. A man will turn over half a library to make a book.

Life, to be worthy of a rational being, must be always in progression; we must always purpose to do more or better than in time past.