I have read descriptions of Paradise that would make any sensible person stop wanting to go there.

Knowledge humanizes mankind, and reason inclines to mildness; but prejudices eradicate every tender disposition.

There are three species of government: republican, monarchical, and despotic.

It is always the adventurers who do great things, not the sovereigns of great empires.

The less luxury there is in a republic, the more it is perfect.

The Christian religion is a stranger to mere despotic power. The mildness so frequently recommended in the Gospel is incompatible with the despotic rage.

An empire founded by war has to maintain itself by war.