Nations, like individuals, interest us in their growth.

In honest truth, a name given to a man is no better than a skin given to him; what is not natively his own falls off and comes to nothing.

If in argument we can make a man angry with us, we have drawn him from his vantage ground and overcome him.

When the mind loses its feeling for elegance, it grows corrupt and groveling, and seeks in the crowd what ought to be found at home.

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

Do not expect to be acknowledged for what you are, much less for what you would be; since no one can well measure a great man but upon the bier.

We fancy we suffer from ingratitude, while in reality we suffer from self-love.