“All that a man does outwardly is but the expression and completion of his inward thought. To work effectively, he must think clearly; to act nobly, he must think nobly
“A moral being is one who is capable of reflecting on his past actions and their motives - of approving of some and disapproving of others
“There is an electric fire in human nature tending to purify - so that among these human creatures there is continually some birth of new heroism. The pity is that we must wonder at it, as we should at finding a pearl in rubbish
“Every man has his moral backside which he refrains from showing unless he has to and keeps covered as long as possible with the trousers of decorum
“I choose my friends for their good looks, my acquaintances for their good characters, and my enemies for their intellects. A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies.
“Good nature is worth more than knowledge, more than money, more than honor, to the persons who possess it.
“A reader seldom peruses a book with pleasure until he knows whether the writer of it be a black man or a fair man, of a mild or choleric disposition, married or a bachelor
“It is fortunate to be of high birth, but it is no less so to be of such character that people do not care to know whether you are or are not.
“As favor and riches forsake a man, we discover in him the foolishness they concealed, and which no one perceived before
“I will give you a definition of a proud man: he is a man who has neither vanity nor wisdom, one filled with hatreds cannot be vain, neither can he be wise
“This is something that I cannot get over, that a whole line could be written by half a man, that a work could be built on the quicksand of a character
“The human species, according to the best theory I can form of it, is composed of two distinct races, the men who borrow, and the men who lend
“It is not the truth that a man possesses, or believes that he possesses, but the earnest effort which he puts forward to reach the truth, which constitutes the worth of a man.
“The hell to be endured hereafter, of which theology tells, is no worse than the hell we make for ourselves in this world by habitually fashioned our characters in the wrong way.
“Grandeur of character lies wholly in force of soul, that is, in the force of thought, moral principle, and love, and this may be found in the humblest condition of life
“The imagination of a boy is healthy, and the mature imagination of a man is healthy; but there is a space of life between, in which the soul is in a ferment, the character undecided, the way of life uncertain, the ambition thick-sighted: thence proceeds mawkishness