“Happy will the house be in which the relationships are formed from character.”

“Character is that which can do without success.”

“Manners are the happy ways of doing things; each one a stroke of genius or of love, now repeated and hardened into usage, they form at last a rich varnish, with which the routine of life is washed, and its details adorned. If they are superficial, so are the dew-drops which give such a depth to the morning meadows.”

“It is remarkable, the character of the pleasure we derive from the best books.”

“Every burned book or house enlightens the world; every suppressed or expunged word reverberates through the earth from side to side.”

“We cannot approach beauty. Its nature is like opaline doves'-neck lustres, hovering and evanescent. Herein it resembles the most excellent things, which all have this rainbow character, defying all attempts at appropriation and use.”

“The crowning fortune of a man is to be born to some pursuit which finds him employment and happiness, whether it be to make baskets, or broadswords, or canals, or statues, or songs.”