We ought not to confine ourselves either to writing or to reading; the one, continuous writing, will cast a gloom over our strength, and exhaust it; the other will make our strength flabby and watery. It is better to have recourse to them alternately, and to blend one with the other, so that the fruits of one's reading may be reduced to concrete form by the pen.

Life is long if it is full.

We are as answerable for what we give as for what we receive; nay, the misplacing of a benefit is worse than the not receiving of it; for the one is another person's fault, but the other is mine.

There is nothing the busy man is less busied with than living; there is nothing harder to learn.

Life without the courage for death is slavery.

Everything hangs on one's thinking.

The miserable are sacred.