I am always for getting a boy forward in his learning, for that is sure good. I would let him at first read any English book which happens to engage his attention; because you have done a great deal when you have brought him to have entertainment from a book. He'll get better books afterwards.

Since life itself is uncertain, nothing which has life for its basis can boast much stability.

Tea's proper use is to amuse the idle, and relax the studious, and dilute the full meals of those who cannot use exercise, and will not use abstinence.

We seldom learn the true want of what we have till it is discovered that we can have no more.

The general remedy of those who are uneasy without knowing the cause is change of place.

There mark what ills the scholar's life assail, toil, envy, want, and patron.

In a man's letters you know, Madam, his soul lies naked, his letters are only the mirror of his breast, whatever passes within him is shown undisguised in its natural process. Nothing is inverted, nothing distorted, you see systems in their elements, you discover actions in their motives.