Avarice is the most oppose of all characters to that of God Almighty, whose alone it is to give and not receive.

Virtues, like essences, lose their fragrance when exposed.

There are no persons more solicitous about the preservation of rank than those who have no rank at all. Observe the humors of a country christening, and you will find no court in Christendom so ceremonious as the quality of Brentford.

I have been formerly so silly as to hope that every servant I had might be made a friend; I am now convinced that the nature of servitude generally bears a contrary tendency. People's characters are to be chiefly collected from their education and place in life; birth itself does but little.

We may daily discover crowds acquire sufficient wealth to buy gentility, but very few that possess the virtues which ennoble human nature, and (in the best sense of the word) constitute a gentleman.

A large, branching, aged oak is perhaps the most venerable of all inanimate objects.

People can commend the weather without envy.