The law of the pleasure in having done anything for another is, that the one almost immediately forgets having given, and the other remembers eternally having received.

He is most powerful who governs himself.

Some pretend want of power to make a competent return; and you shall find in others a kind of graceless modesty, that makes a man ashamed of requiting an obligation, because it is a confession that he has received one.

Do you desire not to be angry? Be not inquisitive. He who inquires what is said of him only works out his own misery.

You need a change of soul rather than a change of climate.

Demand not that I am the equal of the greatest, only that I am better than the wicked.

We are mad, not only individually, but nationally. We check manslaughter and isolated murders; but what of war and the much-vaunted crime of slaughtering whole peoples?