Men are never so likely to settle a question rightly as when they discuss it freely.
Thus our democracy was from an early period the most aristocratic, and our aristocracy the most democratic.
A good constitution is infinitely better than the best despot.
The doctrine which, from the very first origin of religious dissensions, has been held by bigots of all sects, when condensed into a few words and stripped of rhetorical disguise, is simply this: I am in the right, and you are in the wrong. When you are the stronger, you ought to tolerate me; for it is your duty to tolerate truth. But when I am the stronger I shall persecute you; for it is my duty to persecute error.
Men naturally sympathize with the calamities of individuals; but they are inclined to look on a fallen party with contempt rather than with pity.
And how can man die better than facing fearful odds, for the ashes of his fathers, and the temples of his Gods?
Knowledge advances by steps, and not by leaps.
Nothing except the mint can make money without advertising.
Politeness has been well defined as benevolence in small things.
Man is so inconsistent a creature that it is impossible to reason from his beliefs to his conduct, or from one part of his belief to another.
In the plays of Shakespeare man appears as he is, made up of a crowd of passions which contend for the mastery over him, and govern him in turn.
And to say that society ought to be governed by the opinion of the wisest and best, though true, is useless. Whose opinion is to decide who are the wisest and best?
We never could clearly understand how it is that egotism, so unpopular in conversation, should be so popular in writing.
No man who is correctly informed as to the past will be disposed to take a morose or desponding view of the present.
A man possessed of splendid talents, which he often abused, and of a sound judgment, the admonitions of which he often neglected; a man who succeeded only in an inferior department of his art, but who in that department succeeded pre-eminently.
It is the age that forms the man, not the man that forms the age.
A dominant religion is never ascetic.
I shall cheerfully bear the reproach of having descended below the dignity of history.
A history in which every particular incident may be true may on the whole be false.
The Saviour of mankind Himself, in whose blameless life malice could find no act to impeach, has been called in question for words spoken.
It is good to be often reminded of the inconsistency of human nature, and to learn to look without wonder or disgust on the weaknesses which are found in the strongest minds.
As freedom is the only safeguard of governments, so are order and moderation generally necessary to preserve freedom.
The business of everybody is the business of nobody.
The object of oratory alone in not truth, but persuasion.
Every generation enjoys the use of a vast hoard bequeathed to it by antiquity, and transmits that hoard, augmented by fresh acquisitions, to future ages.
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