A woman seldom asks advice before she has bought her wedding clothes.

Everything that is new or uncommon raises a pleasure in the imagination, because it fills the soul with an agreeable surprise, gratifies its curiosity, and gives it an idea of which it was not before possessed.

To be an atheist requires an infinitely greater measure of faith than to receive all the great truths which atheism would deny.

Three grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love, and something to hope for.

What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to the soul.

What sunshine is to flowers, smiles are to humanity. These are but trifles, to be sure; but scattered along life's pathway, the good they do is inconceivable.

Ridicule is generally made use of to laugh men out of virtue and good sense, by attacking everything praiseworthy in human life.

Self discipline is that which, next to virtue, truly and essentially raises one man above another.

If men would consider not so much wherein they differ, as wherein they agree, there would be far less of uncharitableness and angry feeling.

Arguments out of a pretty mouth are unanswerable.

What an absurd thing it is to pass over all the valuable parts of a man, and fix our attention on his infirmities.

It is folly for an eminent person to think of escaping censure, and a weakness to be affected by it. All the illustrious persons of antiquity, and indeed of every age, have passed through this fiery persecution. There is no defense against reproach but obscurity; it is a kind of concomitant to greatness, as satires and invectives were an essential part of a Roman triumph.

How beautiful is death, when earn'd by virtue! Who would not be that youth? What pity is it That we can die but once to serve our country!

Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.