The love of study is in us the only lasting passion. All the others quit us in proportion as this miserable machine which holds them approaches its ruins.

Better it is to say that the government most comfortable to nature is that which best agrees with the humor and disposition of the people in whose favor it is established.

The less men think, the more they talk.

The history of commerce is that of the communication of the people.

A prince who loves and fears religion is a lion who stoops to the hand that strokes or to the voice that appeases him. He who fears and hates religion is like the savage beast that growls and bites the chain, which prevents his flying on the passenger. He who has no religion at all is that terrible animal who perceives his liberty only when he tears in pieces, and when he devours.

What orators lack in depth they make up for in length.

I should like to abolish funerals; the time to mourn a person is at his birth, not his death.