Neither man nor woman can be worth anything until they have discovered that they are fools. The sooner the discovery is made the better, as there is more time and power for taking advantage of it."

"[I]t is safest to take the unpopular side in the first instance. Transit from the unpopular, is easy. . . but from the popular to the unpopular is so steep and rugged that it is impossible to maintain it."

Nobody ever did anything very foolish except from some strong principle.

"It wounds a man less to confess that he has failed in any pursuit through idleness, neglect, the love of pleasure, etc., etc., which are his own faults, than through incapacity and unfitness, which are the faults of his nature."

"[F]riends praise your abilities to the skies, submit to you in argument, and seem to have the greatest deference for you; but, though they may ask it, you never find them following your advice upon their own affairs; nor allowing you to manage your own."