“Discretion is the salt, and fancy the sugar of life; the one preserves, the other sweetens it.”

The small courtesies sweeten life; the greater ennoble it.

Four sweet lips, two pure souls, and one undying affection, – these are love’s pretty ingredients for a kiss.

In the assurance of strength there is strength; and they are the weakest, however strong, who have no faith in themselves or their powers.

It is the passion that is in a kiss that gives to it its sweetness; it is the affection in a kiss that sanctifies it.

A book should be luminous not voluminous.

We give our best affections to the beautiful, only our second best to the useful.

Formerly when great fortunes were only made in war, war was a business; but now, when great fortunes are only made by business, business is war.

False friends are like our shadow, keeping close to us while we walk in the sunshine, but leaving us the instant we cross into the shade.

There are seaons when our passions have slept so long that we know not whether they still exist in us. So does flax forget that it is combustible when the fire is away from it.

Life is indeed either a rich possession or a poor, according as it is made subservient to noble aims or ignoble pleasures.

Great warriors, like great earthquakes, are principally remembered for the mischief they have done.

Give me the character and I will forecast the event.

To vindicate the sanctity of human life by taking it is an outrage upon reason. The spectacle of a human being dangling at the end of a gallows-rope is a degradation of humanity.

If it is a distinction to have written a good book, it is also a disgrace to have written a bad one.

Dignity of position adds to dignity of character, as well as to dignity of carriage. Give us a proud position, and we are impelled to act up to it.

Genius makes its observations in short-hand; talent writes them out at length.

In the practice of tolerance, one’s enemy is the best teacher.

In an artist’s life, death is perhaps not the most difficult thing.

Those who look for the bad in people will surely find it.

I am nothing special, of this I am sure. I am a common man with common thoughts and I’ve led a common life. There are no monuments dedicated to me and my name will soon be forgotten, but I’ve loved another with all my heart and soul, and to me, this has always been enough.

Music is the soundtrack to life. It plays the melody of our being.

You cannot be loving when you are blaming. You cannot be loving when you are criticising. You cannot be loving when you are judging.

There is one thing alone that stands the brunt of life throughout its course; a quiet conscience.

You never know what life is like, until you have lived it.