Friendship is a contract in which we render small services in expectation of big ones.

It is unreasonable ... to oblige a man not to attempt the defense of his own life.

It is requisite the government be so constituted as one man need not be afraid of another.

The incomparable stupidity of life teaches us to love our parents; divine philosophy teaches us to forgive them.

In vain do we seek tranquility in the desert; temptations are always with us; our passions, represented by the demons, never let us alone: those monsters created by the heart, those illusions produced by the mind, those vain specters that are our errors and our lies always appear before us to seduce us; they attack us even in our fasting or our mortifications, in other words, in our very strength.

People here argue about religion interminably, but it appears that they are competing at the same time to see who can be the least devout.

When the savages of Louisiana wish to have fruit, they cut the tree at the bottom and gather the fruit. That is exactly a despotic government.