“Study depends on the goodwill of the student, a quality that cannot be secured by compulsion.”

For it would have been better that man should have been born dumb, nay, void of all reason, rather than that he should employ the gifts of Providence to the destruction of his neighbor.

Usage is the best language teacher.

A Woman who is generous with her money is to be praised; not so, if she is generous with her person.

Suffering itself does less afflict the senses than the apprehension of suffering.

By writing quickly we are not brought to write well, but by writing well we are brought to write quickly.

Although virtue receives some of its excellencies from nature, yet it is perfected by education.

The pretended admission of a fault on our part creates an excellent impression.

A liar ought to have a good memory.

Verse satire indeed is entirely our own.

It is easier to do many things than to do one thing continuously for a long time.

Nature herself has never attempted to effect great changes rapidly.

For the mind is all the easier to teach before it is set.

That which offends the ear will not easily gain admission to the mind.

In a crowd, on a journey, at a banquet even, a line of thought can itself provide its own seclusion.

It is the nurse that the child first hears, and her words that he will first attempt to imitate.

Nothing is more dangerous to men than a sudden change of fortune.

Though nature be ever so generous, yet can she not make a hero alone. Fortune must contribute her part too; and till both concur, the work cannot be perfected.

Somewhere between obsession and compulsion is impulse.

In seasons of tumult and discord bad men have most power; mental and moral excellence require peace and quietness.

By punishing men of talent we confirm their authority.

It is a part of the nature of man to resist compulsion.

Even for learned men, love of fame is the last thing to be given up.

The denial of an objective moral law, based on the compulsion to deny the existence of God, results ultimately in the denial of evil itself.

When we experience the power of the Self, there is an absence of fear, there is no compulsion to control, and no struggle for approval or external power.