You can cultivate taste, as you can the intellect. Full understanding whets the appetite and desire, and, later, sharpens the enjoyment of possession.

The great art of giving consists in this the gift should cost very little and yet be greatly coveted, so that it may be the more highly appreciated.

Don't show off every day, or you'll stop surprising people. There must always be some novelty left over. The person who displays a little more of it each day keeps up expectations, and no one ever discovers the limits of his talent.

Let him that hath no power of patience retire within himself, though even there he will have to put up with himself.

It takes more to make one sage today than it did to make the seven of Greece. And you need more resources to deal with a single person these days than with an entire nation in times past.

You should avoid making yourself too clear even in your explanations.

Begin with another's to end with your own.