The educated differ from the uneducated as much as the living from the dead.

Probable impossibilities are to be preferred to improbable possibilities.

The wise man does not expose himself needlessly to danger, since there are few things for which he cares sufficiently; but he is willing, in great crises, to give even his life -- knowing that under certain conditions it is not worthwhile to live.

No notice is taken of a little evil, but when it increases it strikes the eye.

Great men are always of a nature originally melancholy.

Beauty depends on size as well as symmetry. No very small animal can be beautiful, for looking at it takes so small a portion of time that the impression of it will be confused. Nor can any very large one, for a whole view of it cannot be had at once, and so there will be no unity and completeness.

Character is that which reveals moral purpose, exposing the class of things a man chooses or avoids.

Dignity does not consist in possessing honors, but in deserving them.

Poetry is finer and more philosophical than history; for poetry expresses the universal, and history only the particular.

There is no great genius without a mixture of madness.