It is clearly better that property should be private, but the use of it common; and the special business of the legislator is to create in men this benevolent disposition.

Quid quid movetur ab alio movetur"(nothing moves without having been moved).

Even if we could suppose the citizen body to be virtuous, without each of them being so, yet the latter would be better, for in the virtue of each the virtue of all is involved.

Aristocracy is that form of government in which education and discipline are qualifications for suffrage and office holding.

The life of theoretical philosophy is the best and happiest a man can lead. Few men are capable of it and then only intermittently. For the rest there is a second-best way of life, that of moral virtue and practical wisdom.

All persons ought to endeavor to follow what is right, and not what is established.

There is simple ignorance, which is the source of lighter offenses, and double ignorance, which is accompanied by a conceit of wisdom.