Want of money and the distress of a thief can never be alleged as the cause of his thieving, for many honest people endure greater hardships with fortitude. We must therefore seek the cause elsewhere than in want of money, for that is the miser's passion, not the thief s.

The hours of folly are measured by the clock; but of wisdom, no clock can measure.

What is the price of experience? Do men buy it for a song? Or wisdom for a dance in the street? No, it is bought with the price of all the man hath, his house, his wife, his children.

The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing that stands in the way. Some see nature all ridicule and deformity... and some scarce see nature at all. But to the eyes of the man of imagination, nature is imagination itself.

Poetry fettered, fetters the human race. Nations are destroyed or flourish in proportion as their poetry, painting, and music are destroyed or flourish.

What is grand is necessarily obscure to weak men. That which can be made explicit to the idiot is not worth my care.

When I tell the truth, it is not for the sake of convincing those who do not know it, but for the sake of defending those that do.

A truth that's told with bad intent beats all the lies you can invent.

The weak in courage is strong in cunning.

If the Sun and Moon should ever doubt, they'd immediately go out.

Excessive sorrow laughs. Excessive joy weeps.

What is now proved was once only imagined.

Imagination is the real and eternal world of which this vegetable universe is but a faint shadow.

There is no friendship, no love, like that of the parent for the child.

It is one of the severest tests of friendship to tell your friend his faults. So to love a man that you cannot bear to see a stain upon him, and to speak painful truth through loving words, that is friendship.

Laughter is not a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is the best ending for one.

In this world it is not what we take up, but what we give up, that makes us rich.

It is not the going out of port, but the coming in, that determines the success of a voyage.

Success is full of promise till one gets it, and then it seems like a nest from which the bird has flown.

Every young man would do well to remember that all successful business stands on the foundation of morality.

Tears are often the telescope by which men see far into heaven.

Every charitable act is a stepping stone toward heaven.

Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures.

Our best successes often come after our greatest disappointments.

I can forgive, but I cannot forget, is only another way of saying, I will not forgive. Forgiveness ought to be like a cancelled note - torn in two, and burned up, so that it never can be shown against one.

God pardons like a mother, who kisses the offense into everlasting forgiveness.

The head learns new things, but the heart forever practices old experiences.

The Church is not a gallery for the exhibition of eminent Christians, but a school for the education of imperfect ones.

The art of being happy lies in the power of extracting happiness from common things.

We are always on the anvil; by trials God is shaping us for higher things.

I never knew how to worship until I knew how to love.

The advertisements in a newspaper are more full knowledge in respect to what is going on in a state or community than the editorial columns are.

Of all the music that reached farthest into heaven, it is the beating of a loving heart.

We never know the love of a parent till we become parents ourselves.

In this world, full often, our joys are only the tender shadows which our sorrows cast.

We steal if we touch tomorrow. It is God's.

Flowers are the sweetest things God ever made and forgot to put a soul into.

The dog is the god of frolic.

Greatness lies, not in being strong, but in the right using of strength; and strength is not used rightly when it serves only to carry a man above his fellows for his own solitary glory. He is the greatest whose strength carries up the most hearts by the attraction of his own.

The worst thing in this world, next to anarchy, is government.

He is greatest whose strength carries up the most hearts by the attraction of his own.

The world's battlefields have been in the heart chiefly; more heroism has been displayed in the household and the closet, than on the most memorable battlefields in history.

Gratitude is the fairest blossom which springs from the soul.

The unthankful heart... discovers no mercies; but let the thankful heart sweep through the day and, as the magnet finds the iron, so it will find, in every hour, some heavenly blessings!

A proud man is seldom a grateful man, for he never thinks he gets as much as he deserves.

Pride slays thanksgiving, but a humble mind is the soil out of which thanks naturally grow. A proud man is seldom a grateful man, for he never thinks he gets as much as he deserves.

Good nature is worth more than knowledge, more than money, more than honor, to the persons who possess it.

Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anybody expects of you. Never excuse yourself.

Well married a person has wings, poorly married shackles.

We should not judge people by their peak of excellence; but by the distance they have traveled from the point where they started.