“The liberty of a people consists in being governed by laws which they have made themselves, under whatsoever form it be of government”

There have been fewer friends on earth than kings.

For the whole world, without a native home, Is nothing but a prison of larger room.

The getting out of doors is the greatest part of the journey.

“We may talk what we please,” he cries in his enthusiasm for the oldest of the arts, “of lilies, and lions rampant, and spread eagles

It was not sleep that made him nod, he said, But too great weight and largeness of his head.

Plenty, as well as Want, can separate friends.

Let’s banish business, banish sorrow; To the gods belong to-morrow.

The liberty of a private man, in being master of his own time and actions, as far as may consist with the laws of God and of his country.

To be a husbandman, is but a retreat from the city; to be a philosopher, from the world; or rather, a retreat from the world, as it is man’s, into the world, as it is God’s.

Acquaintance I would have, but when it depends; not on number, but the choice of friends.

Hope is the most hopeless thing of all.

Come, my best Friends! my Books! and lead me on.

Build yourself a book-nest to forget the world without.

Happy insect! what can be In happiness compared to thee? Fed with nourishment divine, The dewy morning’s gentle wine!

Our yesterday’s to-morrow now is gone, And still a new to-morrow does come on. We by to-morrow draw out all our store, Till the exhausted well can yield no more.

Who lets slip fortune, her shall never find: Occasion once past by, is bald behind.

This is what our society needs – not new ideas and inventions; important as these are, and not geniuses and supermen, but persons who can be, that is, persons who have a center of strength within themselves.

Ever since the Greek tragedies, artists have, from time to time, asked themselves how they might influence ongoing political events.

The envied are like bureaucrats; the more impersonal they are, the greater the illusion (for themselves and for others) of their power.

At all times sincere friends of freedom have been rare, and its triumphs have been due to minorities, that have prevailed by associating themselves with auxiliaries whose objects often differed from their own; and this association, which is always dangerous, has sometimes been disastrous.

Capitalism needs neither propaganda nor apostles. Its achievements speak for themselves. Capitalism delivers the goods.

Power is so pleasant that men quickly learn to be greedy in the enjoyment of it, and to flatter themselves that patriotism requires them to be imperious.

Young men of this class never do anything for themselves that they can get other people to do for them, and it is the infatuation, the devotion, the superstition of others that keeps them going. These others in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred are women.

Everybody doesn’t want to have to be a computer scientist to protect themselves. Most people have no desire to do that.