The best kind of conversation is that which may be called thinking aloud.

Habitual liars invent falsehoods not to gain any end or even to deceive their hearers, but to amuse themselves. It is partly practice and partly habit. It requires an effort in them to speak truth.

The number of objects we see from living in a large city amuses the mind like a perpetual raree-show, without supplying it with any ideas.

No man would, I think, exchange his existence with any other man, however fortunate. We had as lief not be, as not be ourselves.

It is only those who never think at all, or else who have accustomed themselves to blood invariably on abstract ideas, that ever feel ennui.

An orator can hardly get beyond commonplaces: if he does he gets beyond his hearers.

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