Henry Adams

Chaos was the law of nature Order was the dream of man.

The Indian Summer of life should be a little sunny and a little sad, like the season, and infinite in wealth and depth of tone, but never hustled.

Unity is vision; it must have been part of the process of learning to see.

A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops.

A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stop.

It is impossible to underrate human intelligence -- beginning with one's own.

No one means all he says, and yet very few say all they mean, for words are slippery and thought is viscous.

The gothic is singular in this one seems easily at home in the renaissance one is not too strange in the Byzantine as for the Roman it is ourselves and we could walk blindfolded through every chink and cranny of the Greek mind all these styles seem modern when we come close to them but the gothic gets away.

If one shed tears, they must be shed on one's pillow.

Friends are born not made.

One friend in a lifetime is much; two are many; three are hardly possible.

In practice, such trifles as contradictions in principle are easily set aside; the faculty of ignoring them makes the practical man.

During an election campaign the air is full of speeches and vice versa.

Chaos often breeds life when order breeds habit.

Average human nature is very coarse, and its ideals must necessarily be average. The world never loved perfect poise. What the world does love is commonly absence of poise, for it has to be amused.

I have written too much history to have faith in it; and if anyone thinks I'm wrong, I am inclined to agree with him.

Man is an imperceptible atom always trying to become one with God.

At best Madrid is a hole, but in rainy weather it is a place fit only to drown rats in.