“Prejudices are so to speak the mechanical instincts of men: through their prejudices they do without any effort many things they would find too difficult to think through to the point of resolving to do them.”

“What I do not like about our definitions of genius is that there is in them nothing of the day of judgment, nothing of resounding through eternity and nothing of the footsteps of the Almighty.”

“It is almost impossible to carry the torch of truth through a crowd without singeing somebody's beard.”

“If we thought more for ourselves we would have very many more bad books and very many more good ones.”

“There are very many people who read simply to prevent themselves from thinking.”

“With most men, unbelief in one thing springs from blind belief in another.”

“Every condition of the soul has its own sign and expression...So you will see how hard it is to seem original without being so.”