The most characteristic mark of a great mind is to choose some one important object, and pursue it for life.
Child of mortality, whence comest thou? Why is thy countenance sad, and why are thine eyes red with weeping?
While Genius was thus wasting his strength in eccentric flights, I saw a person of a very different appearance, named Application.
We can only love what we know.
Of her scorn the maid repented, And the shepherd – of his love.
The awakenings of remorse, virtuous shame and indignation, the glow of moral approbation if they do not lead to action, grow less and less vivid every time they occur, till at length the mind grows absolutely callous.
Say not ‘Good-night’ but in some brighter clime, bid me ‘Good-morning.’
It is to hope, though hope were lost.
The first pale blossom of the unripened year.
So fades a summer cloud away; So sinks the gale when storms are o’er; So gently shuts the eye of day; So dies a wave along the shore.
The well taught philosophic mind To all compassion gives; Casts round the world an equal eye, And feels for all that lives.
Englishmen are said to love their laws; – that is the reason, I suppose, they give us so many of them, and in different editions.
We may think all religions beneficial, and believe of one alone that it is true.
Nobody ought to be too old to improve: I should be sorry if I was; and I flatter myself I have already improved considerably by my travels. First, I can swallow gruel soup, egg soup, and all manner of soups, without making faces much. Secondly, I can pretty well live without tea...
Time deals gently with me; and though I feel that I descend, the slope is easy...
And when midst fallen London, they survey The stone where Alexander’s ashes lay, Shall own with humbled pride the lesson must By Time’s slow finger written in the dust.
Man is the nobler growth our realms supply, And souls are ripened in our northern sky.
Society than solitude is worse, And man to man is still the greatest curse.
It would be difficult to determine whether the age is growing better or worse; for I think our plays are growing like sermons, and our sermons like plays.
Fair Venus shines Even in the eve of day, with sweetest beam Propitious shines, and shakes a trembling flood Of softened radiance from her dewy locks.
The world has little to bestow Where two fond hearts in equal love are joined.