Finally, everybody agrees that no one pursuit can be successfully followed by a man who is preoccupied with many things-eloquence cannot, nor the liberal studies-since the mind, when distracted, takes in nothing very deeply, but rejects everything that is, as it were, crammed into it. There is nothing the busy man is less busied with than living: there is nothing that is harder to learn.

Fate leads the willing, and drags along the reluctant.

The mind, unless it is pure and holy, cannot see God.

All my life I have been seeking to climb out of the pit of my besetting sins and I cannot do it and I never will unless a hand is let down to draw me up.

Indolence is stagnation; employment is life.

What madness it is for a man to starve himself to enrich his heir, and so turn a friend into an enemy! For his joy at your death will be proportioned to what you leave him.

It is a rough road that leads to the heights of greatness. As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.