So much does the moral health depend upon the moral atmosphere that is breathed, and so great is the influence daily exercised by parents over their children by living a life before their eyes, that perhaps the best system of parental instruction might be summed up in these two words: 'Improve thyself.'

The highest culture is not obtained from the teacher when at school or college, so much as by our ever diligent self-education when we become men.

For want of self-restraint many men are engaged all their lives in fighting with difficulties of their own making.

Like men, nations are purified and strengthened by trials.

The egotist is next door to a fanatic.

Lost wealth may be replaced by industry, lost knowledge by study, lost health by temperance or medicine, but lost time is gone forever.

Great men are always exceptional men; and greatness itself is but comparative. Indeed, the range of most men in life is so limited that very few have the opportunity of being great.