“Insist upon yourself. Be original.”

“Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can offer with the cumulative force of a whole life's cultivation, but of the adopted talent of another, you have only an extemporaneous, half possession.”

“The mind, once stretched by a new idea, never returns to its original dimensions.”

“When private men shall act with original views, the lustre will be transferred from the actions of kings to those of gentlemen.”

“The mind of this country, taught to aim at low objects, feeds upon itself.”

“Make the most of yourself....for that is all there is of you.”

“Language is fossil poetry. As the limestone of the continent consists of infinite masses of the shells of animalcules, so language is made up of images, or tropes, which now, in their secondary use, have long ceased to remind us of their poetic origin.”