Reflection brakes men cowards. There is no object that can be put in competition with life, unless it is viewed through the medium of passion, and we are hurried away by the impulse of the moment.

A situation in a public office is secure, but laborious and mechanical, and without the great springs of life, hope and fear.

We are very much what others think of us. The reception our observations meet with gives us courage to proceed, or damps our efforts.

I am always afraid of a fool. One cannot be sure that he is not a knave as well.

Men of gravity are intellectual stammerers, whose thoughts move slowly.

It is not the passion of a mind struggling with misfortune, or the hopelessness of its desires, but of a mind preying on itself, and disgusted with, or indifferent to all other things.

The truth is, we pamper little griefs into great ones, and bear great ones as well as we can.