The most pernicious of absurdities is that weak, blind, stupid faith is better than the constant practice of every human virtue.

We cannot at once catch the applauses of the vulgar and expect the approbation of the wise.

Goodness does not more certainly make men happy than happiness makes them good.

Cruelty is the highest pleasure to the cruel man; it is his love.

I see the rainbow in the sky, the dew upon the grass; I see them, and I ask not why they glimmer or they pass. With folded arms I linger not to call them back; 'twere vain: In this, or in some other spot, I know they'll shine again.

We must distinguish between felicity and prosperity; for prosperity leads often to ambition, and ambition to disappointment; the course is then over, the wheel turns round but once, while the reaction of goodness and happiness is perpetual.

Every great writer is a writer of history, let him treat on almost what subject he may.