“No doubt, when modesty was made a virtue, it was a very advantageous thing for the fools, for everybody is expected to speak of himself as if he were one.”

“Every child is in a way a genius; and every genius is in a way a child.”

“History is the long, difficult and confused dream of Mankind.”

“The doctor sees all the weakness of mankind; the lawyer all the wickedness, the theologian all the stupidity.”

“Every human perfection is linked to an error which it threatens to turn into”

“Such as we are made of, such we be.”

“Let us not look east and west for materials of conversation, but rest in presence and unity. A just feeling will fast enough supply fuel for discourse, if speaking be more grateful than silence. When people come to see us, we foolishly prattle, lest we be inhospitable. But things said for conversation are chalk eggs. Don't say things. What you are stands over you the while, and thunders so that I cannot hear what you say to the contrary.”

“An individual man is a fruit which it cost all the foregoing ages to form and ripen. He is strong, not to do, but to live; not in his arms, but in his heart; not as an agent, but as a fact.”