To see a young couple loving each other is no wonder; but to see an old couple loving each other is the best sight of all.

It seems to me one cannot sit down in that place [the Round Reading room of the British Museum] without a heart full of grateful reverence. I own to have said my grace at the table, and to have thanked Heaven for my English birthright, freely to partake of these beautiful books, and speak the truth I find there.

If, in looking at the lives of princes, courtiers, men of rank and fashion, we must perforce depict them as idle, profligate, and criminal, we must make allowances for the rich men's failings, and recollect that we, too, were very likely indolent and voluptuous, had we no motive for work, a mortal's natural taste for pleasure, and the daily temptation of a large income. What could a great peer, with a great castle and park, and a great fortune, do but be splendid and idle?

I would rather make my name than inherit it.

The best of women are hypocrites.

Come forward, some great marshal, and organize equality in society, and your rod shall swallow up all the juggling old court gold-sticks

Dare and the world always yields; or if it beats you sometimes, dare it again and it will succumb.