I lay very little stress either upon asking or giving advice. Generally speaking, they who ask advice know what they wish to do, and remain firm to their intentions. A man may allow himself to be enlightened on various points, even upon matters of expediency and duty; but, after all, he must determine his course of action, for himself.

War seems to be one of the most salutary phenomena for the culture of human nature; and it is not without regret that I see it disappearing more and more from the scene.

All translating seems to me to be simply an attempt to accomplish an impossible task.

Real inward devotion knows no prayer but that arising from the depths of its own feelings.

When we are not too anxious about happiness and unhappiness, but devote ourselves to the strict and unsparing performance of duty, then happiness comes of itself - nay, even springs from the midst of a life of troubles and anxieties and privations.

Possession, it is true, crowns exertion with rest; but it is only in the illusions of fancy that it has power to charm us.

Results are nothing; the energies which produce them and which again spring from them are everything.