Books are becoming everything to me. If I had at this moment any choice in life, I would bury myself in one of those immense libraries...and never pass a waking hour without a book before me.

Many politicians are in the habit of laying it down as a self-evident proposition that no people ought to be free till they are fit to use their freedom. The maxim is worthy of the fool in the old story who resolved not to go into the water till he had learned to swim.

The upper current of society presents no pertain criterion by which we can judge of the direction in which the under current flows.

Finesse is the best adaptation of means to circumstances.

Free trade, one of the greatest blessings which a government can confer on a people, is in almost every country unpopular.

As freedom is the only safeguard of governments, so are order and moderation generally necessary to preserve freedom.

No man in the world acts up to his own standard of right.