Poverty is the test of civility and the touchstone of friendship.

It is only necessary to raise a bugbear before the English imagination in order to govern it at will. Whatever they hate or fear, they implicitly believe in, merely from the scope it gives to these passions.

The contemplation of truth and beauty is the proper object for which we were created, which calls forth the most intense desires of the soul, and of which it never tires.

A thing is not vulgar merely because it is common.

Death puts an end to rivalship and competition. The dead can boast no advantage over us, nor can we triumph over them.

Envy is littleness of soul.

We do not die wholly at our deaths: we have mouldered away gradually long before. Faculty after faculty, interest after interest, attachment after attachment disappear: we are torn from ourselves while living.