“If we hope for what we are not likely to possess, we act and think in vain, and make life a greater dream and shadow than it really is.
“A cloudy day, or a little sunshine, have as great an influence on many constitutions as the most real blessings or misfortunes
“The important question is not what will yield to man a few scattered pleasures, but what will render his life happy on the whole amount
“Tradition is an important help to history, but its statements should be carefully scrutinized before we rely on them
“Oh, how precious is time, and how it pains me to see it slide away, while I do so little to any good purpose
“Men long for an afterlife in which there apparently is nothing to do but delight in heaven's wonders
“The longest day must have its close -the gloomiest night will wear on to a morning. An eternal, inexorable lapse of moments is ever hurrying the day of the evil to an eternal night, and the night of the just to an eternal day
“It is vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquility; they must have action; and they will make it if they cannot find it
“The boundary between civilization and barbarism is difficult to draw: put one ring in your nose and you are a savage, put two rings in your ears and you are civilized.
“Everything has been said, and we have come too late, now that men have been living and thinking for seven thousand years and more
“There are only three events in a man's life; birth, life, and death; he is not conscious of being born, he dies in pain, and he forgets to live