Hephaistos bears in Homer the double stamp of a Nature-Power, representing the element of fire, and of an anthropomorphic deity who is the god of art… - William Ewart Gladstone

We may have our own opinions about slavery; we may be for or against the South; but there is no doubt that Jefferson Davis and other leaders of the South have made an army; they are making, it appears, a navy; and they have made what is more than either—they have made a Nation... We may anticipate with certainty the success of the Southern States so far as regards their separation from the North. I cannot but believe that that event is as certain as any event yet future and countingent can be.

A rational reaction against the irrational excesses and vagaries of scepticism may, I admit, readily degenerate into the rival folly of credulity. To be engaged in opposing wrong affords, under the conditions of our mental constitution, but a slender guarantee for being right.

Do not let us conceal from ourselves that this country is almost at the present time the solitary citadel of free trade. ... I confidently anticipate...that these doctrines of free trade will in the long run be found to mean nothing in the world except that each man and each country shall turn to the best account, without artificial interference or interruption, the powers and the gifts which God has given them. This is the sum and substance, the Alpha and the Omega, of our creed.