The leafy blossoming present time springs from the whole past, remembered and unrememberable.

The greatest mistake is to imagine that we never err.

Histories are a kind of distilled newspapers.

It is now almost my sole rule of life to clear myself of cants and formulas, as of poisonous Nessus shirts.

Instead of saying that man is the creature of circumstance, it would be nearer the mark to say that man is the architect of circumstance.

The press is the fourth estate of the realm.

And there are Ben [Jonson] and William Shakespeare in wit-combat, sure enough; Ben bearing down like a mighty Spanish war-ship, fraught with all learning and artillery; Shakespeare whisking away from him - whisking right through him, athwart the big bulk and timbers of him; like a miraculous Celestial Light-ship, woven all of sheet-lightning and sunbeams!