Our repugnance to death increases in proportion to our consciousness of having lived in vain.

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

A distinction has been made between acuteness and subtlety of understanding. This might be illustrated by saying that acuteness consists in taking up the points or solid atoms, subtlety in feeling the air of truth.

Defoe says that there were a hundred thousand country fellows in his time ready to fight to the death against popery, without knowing whether popery was a man or a horse.

Truth from the mouth of an honest man and severity from a good-natured man have a double effect.

The severest critics are always those who have either never attempted, or who have failed in original composition.

Learning is, in too many cases, but a foil to common sense; a substitute for true knowledge. Books are less often made use of as spectacles to look at nature with, than as blinds to keep out its strong light and shifting scenery from weak eyes and indolent dispositions. The learned are mere literary drudges.