Steady, firm, and kind government of prisoners is the truest humanity and the best exercise of duty. It is with convicts as with children: unseasonable indulgence, indiscreetly granted, leads to mischiefs which we may deplore but cannot repair.
Category Archive: 1802
What an enthusiastic devotion is that which sends a man from the attractions of home, the ties of neighbourhood, the bonds of country, to range plains, valleys, hills, mountains, for a new flower.
I have had so much at heart. Defeated, not conquered; disappointed, not discouraged. I have but to be more energetic and more faithful in the difficult and painful vocation to which my life is devoted.
Enthusiasm is the divine particle in our composition: with it we are great, generous, and true; without it, we are little, false, and mean.
It is right noble to fight with wickedness and wrong; the mistake is in supposing that spiritual evil can be overcome by physical means.
I worship talents almost. I sinfully dare mourn that I possess them not.
Man is not made better by being degraded; he is seldom restrained from crime by harsh measures, except the principle of fear predominates in his character, and then he is never made radically better for its influence.
An apt quotation is like a lamp which flings its light over the whole sentence.
With care and patience, people may accomplish things which, to an indolent person, would appear impossible.
Think how slow would be your progress in learning without printed books: you could study only manuscripts, and those necessarily must be very few in number. Learn from this to value your books, and always handle them with care.