Academies that are founded at public expense are instituted not so much to cultivate men's natural abilities as to restrain them.

The greatest good is the knowledge of the union which the mind has with the whole nature.

Further conceive, I beg, that a stone, while continuing in motion, should be capable of thinking and knowing, that it is endeavoring, as far as it can, to continue to move. Such a stone, being conscious merely of its own endeavor and not at all indifferent, would believe itself to be completely free, and would think that it continued in motion solely because of its own wish. This is that human freedom, which all boast that they possess, and which consists solely in the fact, that men are conscious of their own desire, but are ignorant of the causes whereby that desire has been determined.

He that can carp in the most eloquent or acute manner at the weakness of the human mind is held by his fellows as almost divine.

A good thing which prevents us from enjoying a greater good is in truth an evil.

The human mind cannot be absolutely destroyed along with the body, but something of it remains, which is eternal.

If men were born free, they would, so long as they remained free, form no conception of good and evil.