Poetry is finer and more philosophical than history; for poetry expresses the universal, and history only the particular.

It is the mark of an educated mind to expect that amount of exactness which the nature of the particular subject admits. It is equally unreasonable to accept merely probable conclusions from a mathematician and to demand strict demonstration from an orator.

We, on the other hand, must take for granted that the things that exist by nature are, either all or some of them, in motion.

The so-called Pythagoreans, who were the first to take up mathematics, not only advanced this subject, but saturated with it, they fancied that the principles of mathematics were the principles of all things.

The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.

It is no easy task to be good.

Laws, when good, should be supreme; and that the magistrate or magistrates should regulate those matters only on which the laws are unable to speak with precision owing to the difficulty of any general principle embracing all particulars.