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

The deafest man can hear praise, and is slow to think any an excess.

Whatever is worthy to be loved for anything is worthy of preservation. A wise and dispassionate legislator, if any such should ever arise among men, will not condemn to death him who has done or is likely to do more service than injury to society. Blocks and gibbets are the nearest objects with legislators, and their business is never with hopes or with virtues.

God scatters beauty as he scatters flowers O'er the wide earth, and tells us all are ours. A hundred lights in every temple burn, And at each shrine I bend my knee in turn.

A critic is never too severe when he only detects the faults of an author. But he is worse than too severe when, in consequence of this detection, be presumes to place himself on a level with genius.

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

It is easy to look down on others; to look down on ourselves is the difficulty.