We Must Never Assume That Which Is

All Bad Literature Rests Upon Imperfect Insight, Or Upon Imitation, Which May Be Defined As Seeing At Second-hand.

There Are Occasions When The Simplest And Fewest Words Surpass In Effect All The Wealth Of Rhetorical Amplification.

It Is Always Understood As An Expression Of Condemnation When Anything In Literature Or Art Is Said To Be Done For Effect; And Yet To Produce An Effect Is The Aim And End Of Both.

Shakespeare Is A Good Raft Whereon To Float Securely Down The Stream Of Time; Fasten Yourself To That And Your Immortality Is Safe.

The Moral Nature Of Man Is More Sacred In My Eyes Than His Intellectual Nature. I Know They Cannot Be Divorced - That Without Intelligence We Should Be Brutes - But It Is The Tendency Of Our Gaping, Wondering Dispositions To Give Pre-eminence To Those Faculties Which Most Astonish Us. Strength Of Character Seldom, If Ever, Astonishes; Goodness, Lovingness, And Quiet Self-sacrifice, Are Worth All The Talents In The World.