[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.

Christianity stamped its character on jurisprudence; for empire has ever a connection with the priesthood.

It is necessary from the very nature of things that power should be a check to power.

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.

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.

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

Europe is a state with several provinces