If you find your mind tempted and entangled in greed, you must suppress the greed and control the temptation; be the master of your own mind.

This I consider to be a valuable principle in life: Do no thing in excess.

All actions beyond the ordinary limits are subject to a sinister interpretation.

Too much noise deafens us; too much light blinds us; too great a distance, or too much of proximity equally prevents us from being able to see; too long or too short a discourse obscures our knowledge of a subject; too much of truth stuns us.

There can be no excess to love, none to knowledge, none to beauty, when these attributes are considered in the purest sense.

Everything in excess is opposed to nature.

Excess generally causes reaction and produces a change in the opposite direction, whether it be in the seasons, or in individuals, or in government.

To hold and fill to overflowing Is not as good as to stop in time. Sharpen a knife-edge to its very sharpest, And the edge will not last long. When gold and diamonds fill your hall, You will not be able to keep them. To be proud with honor and wealth Is to cause one’s

He who seeks for gain, must be at some expense.

Hoards after hoards his rising raptures fill; Yet still he sighs, for hoards are wanting still.