The object of oratory alone in not truth, but persuasion.

In the plays of Shakespeare man appears as he is, made up of a crowd of passions which contend for the mastery over him, and govern him in turn.

Knowledge advances by steps, and not by leaps.

Those who compare the age in which their lot has fallen with a golden age which exists only in imagination, may talk of degeneracy and decay; but no man who is correctly informed as to the past, will be disposed to take a morose or desponding view of the present.

Men are never so likely to settle a question rightly as when they discuss it freely.

Politeness has been well defined as benevolence in small things.

No particular man is necessary to the state. We may depend on it that, if we provide the country with popular institutions, those institutions will provide it with great men.