A nation may lose its liberties in a day and not miss them in a century.

A fondness for reading changes the inevitable dull hours of our life into exquisite hours of delight.

Vanity is as advantageous to a government as pride is dangerous. To be convinced of this we need only represent, on the one hand,the numberless benefits which result from vanity, as industry, the arts, fashions, politeness, and taste; and on the other, the infinite evils which spring from the pride of certain nations, a laziness, poverty, a total neglect of everything.

The English are busy folk; they have no time in which to be polite.

I never listen to calumnies, because if they are untrue I run the risk of being deceived, and if they be true, of hating persons not worth thinking about.

As soon as man enters into a state of society he loses the sense of his weakness; equality ceases, and then commences the state of war.

Talent is a gift which God has given us secretly, and which we reveal without perceiving it.