If I have not read a book before, it is, for all intents and purposes, new to me whether it was printed yesterday or three hundred years ago.

A great man la an abstraction of some one excellence; but whoever fancies himself an abstraction of excellence, so far from being great, may be sure that he is a blockhead, equally ignorant of excellence or defect of himself or others.

No really great man ever thought himself so.

People do not seem to talk for the sake of expressing their opinions, but to maintain an opinion for the sake of talking.

I have a much greater ambition to be the best racket player than the best prose writer.

Zeal will do more than knowledge.

Learning is its own exceeding great reward.