...for it happens that books are the only article of property in which I am richer than my neighbors. - Thomas de Quincey

All glories of flesh vanish, and this, the glory of infantine beauty seen in the mirror of memory, soonest of all.

Awkward disturbances will arise; people will not submit to have their throats cut quietly; they will run, they will kick, they will bite; and, whilst the portrait painter often has to complain of too much torpor in his subject, the artist, in our line, is generally embarrassed by too much animation.

Call for the grandest of all earthly spectacles, what is that? It is the sun going to his rest. Call for the grandest of all human sentiments, what is that? It is that man should forget his anger before he lies down to sleep.