I shall attempt to prove two things: first, that the actions and dispositions of mankind are the offspring of circumstances and events, and not of any original determination that they bring into the world; and, secondly, that the great stream of our voluntary actions essentially depends, not upon the direct and immediate impulses of sense, but upon the decisions of the understanding.

We are so curiously made that one atom put in the wrong place in our original structure will often make us unhappy for life.

My thoughts will be taken up with the future or the past, with what is to come or what has been. Of the present there is necessarily no image.

Hereditary wealth is in reality a premium paid to idleness.

Study with desire is real activity; without desire it is but the semblance and mockery of activity.

Invisible things are the only realities; invisible things alone are the things that shall remain.

Power is not happiness.