“If you put a chain around the neck of a slave, the other end fastens itself around your own.”

“Perpetual modernness is the measure of merit, in every work of art; since the author of it was not misled by anything short- livedor local, but abode by real and abiding traits.”

“The cruelest foe is a masked benefactor. The wars which make history so dreary have served the cause of truth and virtue.”

“Let us draw a lesson from nature, which always works by short ways. When the fruit is ripe, it falls.”

“I could better eat with one who did not respect the truth or the laws, than with a sloven and unpresentable person. Moral qualities rule the world, but at shorter distances, the senses are despotic.”

“Things are often spoke and seldom meant.”

“"Fair, kind, and true" is all my argument,"Fair, kind, and true" varying to other words;And in this change is my invention spent,Three themes in one, which wondrous scope affords.”

“Who has a book of all that monarchs do, He's more secure to keep it shut than shown; For vice repeated is like the wand'ring wind, Blows dust in others' eye, to spread itself; And yet the end of all is bought thus dear, The breath is gone, and the sore eyes see clear To stop the air would hurt them.”

“Virtue and genuine graces in themselves speak what no words can utter.”

“Then others for breath of words respect, Me for my dumb thoughts, speaking in effect.”

“Nature her custom holds, Let shame say what it will.”

“Too busy with the crowded hour to fear to live or die.”

“He decided to give up his large ambition of knowledge and action for any narrow craft or profession, aiming at a much more comprehensive calling, the art of living.”

“Wisdom will never let us stand with any man on an unfriendly footing. We refuse sympathy and intimacy with people, as if we waited for some better sympathy or intimacy to come. But whence and when: Tomorrow will be like today. Life wastes itself while we are preparing to live.”

“Men have died from time to time, and worms have eaten them, but not for love.”

“Present fears are less than horrible imaginings.”

“The very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.”

“What is honour? a word. What is in that word honour? what is that honour? air. A trim reckoning! Who hath it? he that died o' Wednesday. Doth he feel it? no. Doth he hear it? no.”

“Shall we then judge a country by the majority, or by the minority? By the minority, surely.”

“I could better eat with one who did not respect the truth or the laws, than with a sloven and unpresentable person. Moral qualities rule the world, but at shorter distances, the senses are despotic.”