Honorable beginnings should serve to awaken curiosity, not to heighten people's expectations. We are much better off when reality surpasses our expectations, and something turns out better than we thought it would.

Don't express your ideas too clearly. Most people think little of what they understand, and venerate what they do not.

You may be obliged to wage war, but not to use poisoned arrows.

There is no beauty unaided, no excellence that does not sink to the barbarous, unless saved by art.

There are friendships merely for pleasure, some for the exchange of ideas. Rarest are those friends of one's inmost self.

What is not seen is as if it was not. Even the Right does not receive proper consideration if it does not seem right.

To be at ease is better than to be at business.