There are truths which some men despise because they have not examined, and which they will not examine because they despise.

True friendship is like sound health; the value of it is seldom known until it is lost.

Nothing more completely baffles one who is full of trick and duplicity himself, than straight forward and simple integrity in another.

The soundest argument will produce no more conviction in an empty head than the most superficial declamation; as a feather and a guinea fall with equal velocity in a vacuum.

The art of declamation has been sinking in value from the moment that speakers were foolish enough to publish, and hearers wise enough to read.

None are so fond of secrets as those who do not mean to keep them; such persons covet secrets as a spendthrift covets money, for the purpose of circulation.

Much may be done in those little shreds and patches of time which every day produces, and which most men throw away.

Let those who would affect singularity with success first determine to be very virtuous, and they will be sure to be very singular.

Atheism is a system which can communicate neither warmth nor illumination, except from those fagots which your mistaken zeal has lighted up for its destruction.

Deliberate with caution, but act with decision and yield with graciousness, or oppose with firmness.

The study of mathematics, like the Nile, begins in minuteness but ends in magnificence.

If a person is not talented enough to be a novelist, not smart enough to be a lawyer, and his hands are too shaky to perform operations, he becomes a journalist.

Beauty takes courage. Courage itself takes courage.

Talent without money, coach, vision and mission is a piteous adventure.

I have noticed... that men usually leave married women alone and are inclined to treat all wives with respect. This is no great credit to married women.

You must have been warned against letting the golden hours slip by but some of them are golden only because we let them slip by.

It is partly the absence of recorded history which sends women now to the lives of women past for the detailed documentation of their daily lives.

I am a believer and a conformist. Anyone can revolt; it is much more difficult to obey our inner promptings.

I don't wear a lot of high heels.

The threads of circumstance that lead to tomorrow are so tenuous that all the fussing and worrying about decisions is futile compared to the pure randomness of existence.

Culture's worth huge, huge risks. Without culture we're all totalitarian beasts.