There are moments when all anxiety and stated toil are becalmed in the infinite leisure and repose of nature.
There is no value in life except what you choose to place upon it and no happiness in any place except what you bring to it yourself.
Do what nobody else can do for you. Omit to do anything else.
It appears to be a law that you cannot have a deep sympathy with both man and nature.
It is remarkable how closely the history of the apple tree is connected with that of man.
They can do without architecture who have no olives nor wines in the cellar.
There is no odor so bad as that which arises from goodness tainted.
This world is but a canvas to our imagination.
The Artist is he who detects and applies the law from observation of the works of Genius, whether of man or Nature. The Artisan is he who merely applies the rules which others have detected.
Books can only reveal us to ourselves, and as often as they do us this service we lay them aside.
The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right.
We are eager to tunnel under the Atlantic and bring the Old World some weeks nearer to the New, but perchance the first news that will leak through into the broad, flapping American ear will be that the Princess Adelaide has the whooping cough.
It is better to have your head in the clouds, and know where you are... than to breathe the clearer atmosphere below them, and think that you are in paradise.
Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things. They are but improved means to an unimproved end.
I have the habit of attention to such excess, that my senses get no rest - but suffer from a constant strain.
It is best to avoid the beginnings of evil.
Only that day dawns to which we are awake.
The light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us. Only that day dawns to which we are awake. There is more day to dawn. The sun is but a morning star.
If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.
Is the babe young? When I behold it, it seems more venerable than the oldest man.