He who hath many friends hath none.

Art completes what nature cannot bring to finish. The artist gives us knowledge of nature's unrealized ends.

Those who excel in virtue have the best right of all to rebel, but then they are of all men the least inclined to do so.

Just as a royal rule, if not a mere name, must exist by virtue of some great personal superiority in the king, so tyranny, which is the worst of governments, is necessarily the farthest removed from a well-constituted form; oligarchy is little better, for it is a long way from aristocracy, and democracy is the most tolerable of the three.

That which is common to the greatest number has the least care bestowed upon it. Every one thinks chiefly of his own, hardly at all of the common interest; and only when he is himself concerned as an individual. For besides other considerations, everybody is more inclined to neglect the duty which he expects another to fulfill.

A good style must have an air of novelty, at the same time concealing its art.

Happiness is prosperity combined with virtue.