"I had gone to take a walk on a fine Sabbath afternoon, early in 1765... I was thinking upon the engine at the time... when the idea came into my mind that as steam was an elastic body it would rush in…"

"I have spent more time fixing other men's mistakes than making my own."

"In the mean time do all you can to cure him of Bashfullness which will ruin him in this impudent age; but beware he be not led into the opposite vice of self conceit or arrogance which is 1000 times w…"

"Nothing man has discovered or imagined is to be named with the steam engine. It has no fellow."

"When once the idea of the separate condensation was started, all these improvements followed as corollaries in quick succession, so that in the course of one or two days the invention was thus far com…"