“Had Windham possessed discretion in debate, or Sheridan in conduct, they might have ruled their age.”

“It is a maxim, that those, to whom everybody allows the second place, have an undoubted title to the first.”

“All panegyrics are mingled with an infusion of poppy.”

“If a man will observe as he walks the streets, I believe he will find the merriest countenances in mourning coaches.”

“If a man makes me keep my distance, the comfort is, he keeps his at the same time.”

“Now, my masters, happy man be his dole, say I; every man to his business.”

“No profit grows where no pleasure is taken.”

“Why, universal plodding poisons up The nimble spirits in the arteries, As motion and long-during action tires The sinewy vigor of the traveller.”

“Let the reader find that he cannot afford to omit any line of your writing because you you have omitted every word that he can spare.”

“A man should have a farm or a mechanical craft for his culture. We must have a basis for our higher accomplishments, our delicate entertainments of poetry and philosophy, in the work of our hands.”

“What a labour writing is ... making one sentence do the work of a page; that's what I call hard work.”

“I say, without characters, fame lives long.”

“Lord Bacon told Sir Edward Coke when he was boasting, The less you speak of your greatness, the more shall I think of it.”

“'Tis better to be vile than vile esteemed, When not to be, receives reproach of being, And the just pleasure lost, which is so deemed, Not by our feeling, but by others' seeing.”

“When the sea was calm all ships alike showed mastership in floating.”

“Well could he ride, and often men would say, "That horse his mettle from his rider takes: Proud of subjection, noble by the sway, What rounds, what bounds, what course, what stop he makes!" And controversy hence a question takes, Whether the horse by him became his deed, Or he his manage by the well-doing steed.”

“Tis an ill cook that cannot lick his own fingers.”