I deny the lawfulness of telling a lie to a sick man for fear of alarming him; you have no business with consequences, you are to tell the truth.

I do not envy a clergyman's life as an easy life, nor do I envy the clergyman who makes it an easy life.

Distance has the same effect on the mind as on the eye.

Courage is the greatest of all virtues, because if you haven't courage, you may not have an opportunity to use any of the others.

There are occasions on which it is noble to dare to stand alone. To be pious among infidels, to be disinterested in a time of general venality, to lead a life of virtue and reason in the midst of sensualists, is a proof of a mind intent on nobler things than the praise or blame of men, of a soul fixed in the contemplation of the highest good, and superiour to the tyranny of custom and example.

Sorrow is a kind of rust of the soul, which every new idea contributes in its passage to scour away. It is the putrefaction of stagnant life, and is remedied by exercise and motion.

The true art of memory is the art of attention.