A fondness for reading changes the inevitable dull hours of our life into exquisite hours of delight.

It is not the young people that degenerate; they are not spoiled till those of mature age are already sunk into corruption.

A fondness for reading changes the inevitable dull hours of our life into exquisite hours of delight.

When virtue is banished, ambition invades the minds of those who are disposed to receive it and avarice possesses the whole community.

The alms given to a naked man in the street do not fulfil the obligations of the state, which owes to every citizen a certain subsistence, a proper nourishment, convenient clothing, and a kind of life not incompatible with health.

Virtue has needs of limits.

[The Pope] will make the king believe that three are only one, that the bread he eats is not bread... and a thousand other things of the same kind.