Christians are beginning to lose the spirit of intolerance which animated them: experience has shown the error of the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, and of the persecution of those Christians in France whose belief differed a little from that of the king. They have realized that zeal for the advancement of religion is different from a due attachment to it; and that in order to love it and fulfil its behests, it is not necessary to hate and persecute those who are opposed to it.

If the triangles made a god, they would give him three sides.

...when the laws have ceased to be executed, as this can only come from the corruption of the republic, the state is already lost.

The sublimity of administration consists in knowing the proper degree of power that should be exerted on different occasions.

The success of most things depends upon knowing how long it will take to succeed.

The spirit of commerce is frugality, economy, moderation, labor, ponderance, tranquillity, order, and rule. So long as this spirit subsides, the riches it produces have no bad effect. The mischief is when excessive wealth destroys the spirit of commerce, then it is that the conveniences of inequality... are felt.

When a government is arrived to that degree of corruption as to be incapable of reforming itself, it would not lose much by being new moulded.