Exactness and neatness in moderation is a virtue, but carried to extremes narrows the mind.

The past but lives in written words: a thousand ages were blank if books had not evoked their ghosts, and kept the pale unbodied shades to warn us from fleshless lips.

Had we not faults of our own, we should take less pleasure in complaining of others.

Do not make best friends with a melancholy sad soul. They always are heavily loaded, and you must bear half.

Children are excellent observers, and will often perceive your slightest defects. In general, those who govern children, forgive nothing in them, but everything in themselves.

If the riches of the Indies, or the crowns of all the kingdoms of Europe, were laid at my feet in exchange for my love of reading, I would spurn them all.

A good historian is timeless; although he is a patriot, he will never flatter his country in any respect.