Some day science may have the existence of mankind in power, and the human race can commit suicide by blowing up the world.
American society is a sort of flat, fresh-water pond which absorbs silently, without reaction, anything which is thrown into it.
The American President resembles the commander of a ship at sea. He must have a helm to grasp, a course to steer, a port to seek.
The effect of power and publicity on all men is the aggravation of self, a sort of tumor that ends by killing the victim’s sympathies.
Only on the edge of the grave can man conclude anything.
No man, however strong, can serve ten years as schoolmaster, priest, or Senator, and remain fit for anything else.
No man means all he says, and yet very few say all they mean, for words are slippery and thought is viscous.
Man is an imperceptible atom always trying to become one with God.
I have written too much history to have faith in it; and if anyone thinks I’m wrong, I am inclined to agree with him.
Accident counts for as much in companionship as in marriage.
The press is the hired agent of a monied system, and set up for no other purpose than to tell lies where their interests are involved. One can trust nobody and nothing.
The Indian Summer of life should be a little sunny and a little sad, like the season, and infinite in wealth and depth of tone, but never hustled.
Nothing is more tiresome than a superannuated pedagogue.
The less a tourist knows, the fewer mistakes he need make, for he will not expect himself to explain ignorance.
Society is immoral and immortal; it can afford to commit any kind of folly, and indulge in any sort of vice; it cannot be killed, and the fragments that survive can always laugh at the dead.
If one shed tears, they must be shed on one’s pillow.
My rule in making up examination questions is to ask questions which I can’t myself answer. It astounds me to see how some of my students answer questions which would play the deuce with me.
Whenever a man reaches the top of the political ladder, his enemies unite to pull him down. His friends become critical and exacting.
Politics cannot stop to study psychology Its methods are rough; its judgments rougher still.
Susceptibility to the highest forces is the highest genius.