Dissimulation is innate in woman, and almost as much a quality of the stupid as of the clever.

Hope is the confusion of the desire for a thing with its probability.

The mother of useful arts is necessity; that of the fine arts is luxury. For father the former has intellect; the latter genius, which itself is a kind of luxury.

One man is more concerned with the impression he makes on the rest of mankind, another with the impression the rest of mankind makes on him.

Every parting gives a foretaste of death, every reunion a hint of the resurrection.

To form a judgment intuitively is the privilege of few; authority and example lead the rest of the world. They see with the eyes of others, they hear with the ears of others. Therefore it is very easy to think as all the world now think; but to think as all the world will think thirty years hence is not in the power of every one.

When you look back on your life, it looks as though it were a plot, but when you are into it, it's a mess: just one surprise after another. Then, later, you see it was perfect.