Principles do not mainly influence even the principled; we talk on principle, but we act on interest.

Consciousness of error is, to a certain extent, a consciousness of understanding; and correction of error is the plainest proof of energy and mastery.

I sometimes think that the most plaintive ditty has brought a fuller joy and of longer duration to its composer that the conquest of Persia to the Macedonian.

A mercantile democracy may govern long and widely; a mercantile aristocracy cannot stand.

Every good writer has much idiom; it is the life and spirit of language.

The moderate are not usually the most sincere, for the same circumspection which makes them moderate makes them likewise retentive of what could give offence.

Those who speak against the great do not usually speak from morality, but from envy.