Childhood is like a mirror, which reflects in after life the images first presented to it.

No laws, however stringent, can make the idle industrious, the thriftless provident, or the drunken sober. Such reforms can only be effected by means of individual action, economy and self-denial; by better habits, rather than by greater rights.

Commonplace though it may appear, this doing of one's duty embodies the highest ideal of life and character. There may be nothing heroic about it; but the common lot of men is not heroic.

Progress, of the best kind, is comparatively slow

Though an inheritance of acres may be bequeathed, an inheritance of knowledge and wisdom cannot. The wealthy man may pay others for doing his work for him; but it is impossible to get his thinking done for him by another, or to purchase any kind of self-culture.

Knowledge conquered by labor becomes a possession -a property entirely our own.

Obedience, submission, discipline, courage--these are among the characteristics which make a man.