"No great and enduring volume can ever be written about the flea, though many there be who have tried it."

"To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme."

"So magnifying is the virtue of a large and liberal theme! We expand to its bulk."

"One often hears of writers that rise and swell with their subject, though it may seem an ordinary one. How then with me, writing of this...

"Ah, mortal! then be heedful; for so, in all this din of the great world's loom, thy subtlest thinkings may be overheard afar."

"For, they say, when cruising in an empty ship, if you can get nothing better out of the world, get a good dinner out of it, at least."

"What is best left alone, that accursed thing is not always what least allures."

"This round gold is but the image of the rounder globe, which, like a magician's glass to each and every man in turn but mirrors back his...

"There is a wisdom that is woe; but there is a woe that is madness"

"Mortal man who hath more of joy than sorrow in him, that mortal man cannot be true - not true, or undeveloped."