The way to get on in the world is to be neither more nor less wise, neither better nor worse than your neighbours.

The assumption of merit is easier, less embarrassing, and more effectual than the actual attainment of it.

The ignorance of the world leaves one at the mercy of its malice.

Of all eloquence a nickname is the most concise; of all arguments the most unanswerable.

We do not see nature with our eyes, but with our understandings and our hearts.

As we grow old, our sense of the value of time becomes vivid. Nothing else, indeed, seems of any consequence.

It may be made a question whether men grow wiser as they grow older, any more than they grow stronger or healthier or honester.

We do not die wholly at our deaths: we have mouldered away gradually long before. Faculty after faculty, interest after interest, attachment after attachment disappear: we are torn from ourselves while living.

Just as much as we see in others we have in ourselves.

He who is as faithful to his principles as he is to himself is the true partisan.