Life is made up of a series of judgments on insufficient data, and if we waited to run down all our doubts, it would flow past us.

(Common law) stands as a monument slowly raised, like a coral reef, from the minute accretions of past individuals, of whom each built upon the relics which his predecessors left, and in his turn left a foundation upon which his successors might work

I submit to you that we must press along. Borrowing from Epictetus, let us say to ourselves: "Since we are men, we will play the part of Man".

In the end it is worse to suppress dissent than to run the risk of heresy.

My vote is one of the most unimportant acts of my life; if I were to acquaint myself with the matters on which it ought really to depend, if I were to try to get a judgment on which I was willing to risk affairs of even the smallest moment, I should be doing nothing else, and that seems a fatuous conclusion to a fatuous undertaking.

We may win when we lose, if we have done what we can; for by so doing we have made real at least some part of that finished product in whose fabrication we are most concerned: ourselves.