"It is not enough to be busy. So are the ants. The question is: What are we busy about?"

"I perceive that, when an acorn and a chestnut fall side by side, the one does not remain long in the mould of the other, but makes its own bed, and pushes itself away the shortest and surest way, by i…"

"We are always getting ready to live, but never living."

"Books are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of generations and nations."

"The greatest compliment that was ever paid me was when one asked me what I thought, and attended to my answer."