Mercy among the virtues is like the moon among the stars ... It is the light that hovers above the judgment seat.

A true man never frets about his place in the world, but just slides into it by the gravitation of his nature, and swings there as easily as a star.

Liberty is an old fact; it has had its heroes and its martyrs in almost every age. As I look back through the vista of centuries, I can see no end of the ranks of those who have toiled and suffered in its cause, and who wear upon their breasts its stars of the legion of honor.

Objects close to the eye shut out much larger objects on the horizon; and splendors born only of the earth eclipse the stars. So it is with people who sometimes cover the entire disc of eternity with a dollar, and so quench transcendent glories with a little shining dust.