The most civilized people are as near to barbarism as the most polished steel is to rust. Nations, like metals, have only a superficial brilliancy.
Man spends his life in reasoning on the past, in complaining of the present, in fearing future.
Vices are often habits rather than passions.
It has been very truly said that the mob has many heads, but no brains.
It is the dim haze of mystery that adds enchantment to pursuit.
Speech is external thought, and thought internal speech.
It is easy for men to write and talk like philosophers, but to act with wisdom, there is the rub!
A fool may have his coat embroidered with gold, but it is a fool's coat still.
The methods that help a man acquire a fortune are the very ones that keep him from enjoying it.
The absolute ruler may be a Nero, but he is sometimes a Titus or Marc Aurelius; the people is often Nero, but never Marc Aurelius.
Of every ten persons who talk about you, nine will say something bad, and the tenth will say something good in a bad way.
Brave men do not boast nor bluster. Deeds, not words, speak for such.
The modest man has everything to gain, and the arrogant man everything to lose; for modesty has always to deal with generosity, and arrogance with envy.
The world is governed by love,--self-love.
The only thing wealth does for some people is to make them worry about losing it.
Women read each other at a single glance.
Opinions, theories, and systems pass by turns over the grindstone of time, which at first gives them brilliancy and sharpness, but finally wears them out.
Ideas are a capital that bears interest only in the hands of talent.
Silence never yet betrayed any one!
Extremes produce reaction. Beware that our boasted civilization does not lapse into barbarism.
Cats don't caress us-they caress themselves on us.
That which happens to the soil when it ceases to be cultivated by the social man happens to man himself when he foolishly forsakes society for solitude; the brambles grow up in his desert heart.
If poverty makes man groan, he yawns in opulence. When fortune exempts us from labor, nature overwhelms us with time.
Mind is the partial side of men; the heart is everything.
The mischief of children is seldom actuated by malice; that of grown-up people always is.
