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.

A rational army would run away.

What unhappy beings men are! They constantly waver between false hopes and silly fears, and instead of relying on reason they create monsters to frighten themselves with, and phantoms which lead them astray.

Lunch kills half of Paris, supper the other half.

If I knew of something that could serve my nation but would ruin another, I would not propose it to my prince, for I am first a man and only then a Frenchman... because I am necessarily a man, and only accidentally am I French.

There is a very good saying that if triangles invented a god, they would make him three-sided.

The pagan religion, which prohibited only some of the grosser crimes, and which stopped the hand but meddled not with the heart, might have crimes that were inexplicable.