"Life is to be entered upon with courage."

"The debates of that great assembly are frequently vague and perplexed, seeming to be dragged rather than to march, to the intended goal. Something of this sort must, I think, always happen in public democratic assemblies."

"In other words, a democratic government is the only one in which those who vote for a tax can escape the obligation to pay it."

"He was as great as a man can be without morality."

"The human mind is capable of excitement without the application of gross and violent stimulants and he must have a very faint perception of its beauty and dignity who does not know this."

"Don't tell your kids you had an easy birth or they won't respect you. For years I used to wake up my daughter and say, 'Melissa you ripped me to shreds. Now go back to sleep.'."

"If there is one realm in which it is essential to be sublime, it is in wickedness. You spit on a petty thief, but you can't deny a kind of respect for the great criminal."

"The degree in which a poet's imagination dominates reality is, in the end, the exact measure of his importance and dignity."