Gold no longer 'gilds the straitened forehead of the fool.' The gifts of person, mind, and disposition; beauty, wit, eloquence, kindness, generosity, geniality, courage, are sure of transmission to posterity.

Every generation is sifted through a little finer mesh than the last.

The attributes that human nature admires are preserved, those that repel it are left behind.

There are, of course, a great many women who with love must mingle admiration, and seek to wed greatly, but these not the less obey the same law, for to wed greatly now is not to marry men of fortune or title, but those who have risen above their fellows by the solidity or brilliance of their services to humanity.

These form nowadays the only aristocracy with which alliance is distinction.
"You were speaking, a day or two ago, of the physical superiority of our people to your contemporaries.