By nature a philosopher is not in genius and disposition half so different from a street porter, as a mastiff is from a greyhound

The learned ignore the evidence of their senses to preserve the coherence of the ideas of their imagination.

As we have no immediate experience of what other men feel, we can form no idea of the manner in which they are affected, but by conceiving what we ourselves should feel in the like situation.

The proprietor of stock is necessarily a citizen of the world, and is not necessarily attached to any particular country.

The machines that are first invented to perform any particular movement are always the most complex, and succeeding artists generally discover that, with fewer wheels, with fewer principles of motion, than had originally been employed, the same effects may be more easily produced. The first systems, in the same manner, are always the most complex.

That wealth and greatness are often regarded with the respect and admiration which are due only to wisdom and virtue; and that the contempt, of which vice and folly are the only proper objects, is most often unjustly bestowed upon poverty and weakness, has been the complaint of moralists in all ages.

Whenever the legislature attempts to regulate differences between masters and their workmen, its counsellors are always the masters. When the regulation, therefore, is in favor of the workmen, it is always just and equitable; but it is sometimes otherwise when in favor of the masters.