What we gave, we have; What we spent, we had; What we left, we lost.

Most of our censure of others is only oblique praise of self, uttered to show the wisdom and superiority of the speaker. It has all the invidiousness of self-praise, and all the ill-desert of falsehood.

Appreciation, whether of nature, or books, or art, or men, depends very much on temperament. What is beauty or genius or greatness to one, is far from being so to another.

We never do evil so thoroughly and heartily as when led to it by an honest but perverted, because mistaken, conscience.

Sin with the multitude, and your responsibility and guilt are as great and as truly personal, as if you alone had done the wrong

A holy life is not an ascetic, or gloomy or solitary life, but a life regulated by divine truth and faithful in Christian duty. It is living above the world while we are still in it.

The first step to improvement, whether mental, moral, or religious, is to know ourselves - our weaknesses, errors, deficiencies, and sins, that, by divine grace, we may overcome and turn from them all.