universal compassion is the only guarantee of morality.

Without books the development of civilization would have been impossible. They are the engines of change, windows on the world, "Lighthouses" as the poet said "erected in the sea of time." They are companions, teachers, magicians, bankers of the treasures of the mind, Books are humanity in print.

All wanting comes from need, therefore from lack, therefore from suffering.

Money is human happiness in the abstract; he, then, who is no longer capable of enjoying human happiness in the concrete devotes himself utterly to money.

What a man is contributes much more to his happiness than what he has or how he is regarded by others.

(Politeness is) a tacit agreement that people's miserable defects, whether moral or intellectual, shall on either side be ignored and not be made the subject of reproach.

Our life is a loan received from death with sleep as the daily interest on this loan.