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

The spirit of commerce... renders every man willing to live on his own property...& prevents the growth of luxury.

Countries are not cultivated in proportion to their fertility, but to their liberty.

Passion makes us feel, but never see clearly.

In vain do we seek tranquility in the desert; temptations are always with us; our passions, represented by the demons, never let us alone: those monsters created by the heart, those illusions produced by the mind, those vain specters that are our errors and our lies always appear before us to seduce us; they attack us even in our fasting or our mortifications, in other words, in our very strength.

There are bad examples which are worse than crimes; and more states have perished from the violation of morality than from the violation of law.

It is always the adventurous who accomplish great things.