Charity, like nature, abhors a vacuum. Next to putting it in a bank, men like to squander their superfluous wealth on those to whom it is sure to be doing the least possible good.

Of all eloquence a nickname is the most concise; of all arguments the most unanswerable.

I do not think there is anything deserving the name of society to be found out of London.

The greatest pleasure in life is that of reading while we are young. I have had as much of this pleasure perhaps as any one.

The love of liberty is the love of others; the love of power is the love of ourselves.

Want of principle is power. Truth and honesty set a limit to our efforts, which impudence and hypocrisy easily overleap.

Mankind are so ready to bestow their admiration on the dead, because the latter do not hear it, or because it gives no pleasure to the objects of it. Even fame is the offspring of envy.