A man possessed of splendid talents, which he often abused, and of a sound judgment, the admonitions of which he often neglected; a man who succeeded only in an inferior department of his art, but who in that department succeeded pre-eminently.

Byron owed the vast influence which he exercised over his contemporaries at least as much to his gloomy egotism as to the real power of his poetry.

The real object of the drama is the exhibition of human character.

What proposition is there respecting human nature which is absolutely and universally true? We know of only one,--and that is not only true, but identical,--that men always act from self-interest.

If ever Shakespeare rants, it is not when his imagination is hurrying him along, but when he is hurrying his imagination along.

History distinguishes what is accidental and transitory in human nature from what is essential and immutable.

To carry the spirit of peace into war is a weak and cruel policy. When an extreme case calls for that remedy which is in its own nature most violent, and which, in such cases, is a remedy only because it is violent, it is idle to think of mitigating and diluting. Languid war can do nothing which negotiation or submission will do better: and to act on any other principle is, not to save blood and money, but to squander them.