A nickname is the hardest stone that the devil can throw at a man.

We often forget our dreams so speedily: if we cannot catch them as they are passing out at the door, we never set eyes on them again.

There are only three pleasures in life pure and lasting, and all derived from inanimate things-books, pictures and the face of nature.

Tears may be considered as the natural and involuntary resource of the mind overcome by some sudden and violent emotion, before ithas had time to reconcile its feelings to the change in circumstances: while laughter may be defined to be the same sort of convulsive and involuntary movement, occasioned by mere sur prise or contrast (in the absence of any more serious emotion), before it has time to reconcile its belief to contradictory appearances.

There is a secret pride in every human heart that revolts at tyranny. You may order and drive an individual, but you cannot make him respect you.

Life is a continued struggle to be what we are not, and to do what we cannot.

We are all of us, more or less, the slaves of opinion.