Sweet are the little brooks that run
O'er pebbles glancing in the sun.
Singing in soothing tones. [ Hood ]

Rough diamonds may sometimes be mistaken for pebbles. [ Sir Thomas Browne ]

Many men's thoughts are not acorns, but merely pebbles. [ Charles Buxton ]

Fame, we may understand, is no sure test of merit, but only a probability of such: it is an accident, not a property, of a man; like light, it can give little or nothing, but at most may show what is given; often it is but a false glare, dazzling the eyes of the vulgar, lending, by casual extrinsic splendour, the brightness and manifold glance of the diamond to pebbles of no value. [ Carlyle ]