Books are a world in themselves, it is true; but they are not the only world. The world itself is a volume larger than all the libraries in it.

A gentle word, a kind look, a good-natured smile can work wonders and accomplish miracles.

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.

The imagination is of so delicate a texture that even words wound it.

The most sensible people to be met with in society are men of business and of the world, who argue from what they see and know, instead of spinning cobweb distinctions of what things ought to be.

If the world were good for nothing else, it is a fine subject for speculation.

Any one may mouth out a passage with a theatrical cadence, or get upon stilts to tell his thoughts; but to write or speak with propriety and simplicity is a more difficult task. Thus it is easy to affect a pompous style, to use a word twice as big as the thing you want to express; it is not so easy to pitch upon the very word that exactly fits it.