“The readiest and surest way to get rid of censure, is to correct ourselves.”

As a vessel is known by the sound, whether it be cracked or not; so men are proved, by their speeches, whether they be wise or foolish.

You cannot have a proud and chivalrous spirit if your conduct is mean and paltry; for whatever a man’s actions are, such must be his spirit.

Close alliances with despots are never safe for free states.

The more able a man is, if he make ill use of his abilities, the more dangerous will he be to the commonwealth.

To remind a man of the good turns you have done him is very much like a reproach.

The best protection for the people is not necessarily to believe everything people tell them.

What a man wishes, he will believe.

Whatever shall be to the advantage of all, may that prevail!

There is a great deal of wishful thinking in such cases it is the easiest thing of all to deceive ones self.

Every advantage in the past is judged in the light of the final issue.

Small opportunities often presage great enterprises.

One believes in what one wants to believe in.

Success has a great tendency to conceal and throw a veil over the evil deeds of men.

He who confers a favor should at once forget it, if he is not to show a sordid ungenerous spirit. To remind a man of a kindness conferred and to talk of it, is little different from reproach.

Good fortune is the greatest of blessings, but good counsel comes next, and the lack of it destroys the other also.

Everything great is not always good, but all good things, are great.

My approach works not by making valid predictions but by allowing me to correct false ones.

Whenever a man can get hold of numbers, they are invaluable: if correct, they assist in informing his own mind, but they are still more useful in deluding the minds of others. Numbers are the masters of the weak, but the slaves of the strong.

I think judicial temperament is a willingness to step back from your own committed views of the correct jurisprudential approach and evaluate those views in terms of your role as a judge.

A man must be big enough to admit his mistakes, smart enough to profit from them, and strong enough to correct them.

Though you may be last to discover your follies, be always first to correct them.

All leaders make mistakes. They are a part of life. Successful leaders recognize their errors, learn from them, and work to correct their faults.

I thought I was benefiting the Indians as well as the government, by taking them all over the United States, and giving them a correct idea of the customs, life, etc., of the pale faces, so that when they returned to their people they could make known all they had seen.

I thought I was benefiting the Indians as well as the government, by taking them all over the United States, and giving them a correct idea of the customs, life, etc., of the pale faces, so that when they returned to their people they could make known all they had seen.