On entering this world our starting-point is ignorance. None, however, but idiots remain there.
A teacher who is attempting to teach without inspiring the pupil with a desire to learn is hammering on cold iron.
Common sense is better than genius, and hence its bestowment is more universal.
Reproof is a medicine, like mercury or opium; if it be improperly administered, it will do harm instead of good.
They who set an example make a highway. Others follow the example, because it is easier to travel on a highway than over untrodden grounds.
You need not tell all the truth, unless to those who have a right to know it; but let all you tell be truth.
A teacher should, above all things, first induce a desire in the pupil for the acquisition he wishes to impart.
A republican form of government, without intelligence in the people, must be, on a vast scale, what a mad-house, without superintendent or keepers, would be on a small one.
There is nothing so costly as ignorance.
We go by the major vote, and if the majority are insane, the sane must go to the hospital.
He who cannot resist temptation is not a man. Whoever yields to temptation debases himself with a debasement from which he can never arise.
We must be purposely kind and generous or we miss the best part of life’s existence.
We do ourselves the most good doing something for others.
Biography, especially of the great and good, who have risen by their own exertions to eminence and usefulness, is an inspiring and ennobling study. Its direct tendency is to reproduce the excellence it records.
Had I the power, I would scatter libraries over the whole land, as the sower sows his wheat-field.
One thing I certainly never was made for, and that is to put principles on and off at the dictation of a party, as a lackey changes his livery at his master’s command.
Injustice alone can shake down the pillars of the skies, and restore the reign of Chaos and Night.
He who cannot resist temptation is not a man.
Patient perseverance in well doing is infinitely harder than a sudden and impulsive self-sacrifice.
In dress, seek the middle between foppery and shabbiness.