Our greatest happiness does not depend on the condition of life in which chance has placed us, but is always the result of a good conscience, good health, occupation and freedom in all just pursuits. On matters of style, swim with the current, on matters of principle, stand like a rock. No man will ever bring out of the Presidency the reputation which carries him into it. To myself, personally, it brings nothing but increasing drudgery and daily loss of friends. Never suppose that in any possible situation or under any circumstances that it is best for you to do a dishonorable thing however slightly so it may appear to you. Encourage all your virtuous dispositions, and exercise them whenever an opportunity arises, being assured that they will gain strength by exercise...and that exercise will make them habitual. Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today. Let common sense and common honesty have fair play, and they will soon set things to rights. I find friendship to be like wine, raw when new, ripened with age, the true old man's milk and restorative cordial. It was more in our spirit to let things come to rights by the plain dictates of common sense than by the practice of any artifices. I have ever deemed it more honorable and more profitable, too, to set a good example than to follow a bad one. I'm a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it. | 
