Religion either makes men wise and virtuous, or it makes them set up false pretenses to both.

What are the publications that succeed? Those that pretend to teach the public that the persons they have been accustomed unwittingly to look up to as the lights of the earth are no better than themselves.

To write a genuine familiar or truly English style is to write as anyone would speak in common conversation, who had a thorough command and choice of words, or who could discourse with ease, force, and perspicuity, setting aside all pedantic and oratorical flourishes.

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

To display the greatest powers, unless they are applied to great purposes, makes nothing for the character of greatness.

Dr. Johnson was a lazy learned man who liked to think and talk better than to read or write; who, however, wrote much and well, but too often by rote.

We are never so much disposed to quarrel with others as when we are dissatisfied with ourselves.