Hatred which is completely vanquished by love passes into love: and love is thereupon greater than if hatred had not preceded it.

Many errors, of a truth, consist merely in the application of the wrong names of things.

Everything excellent is as difficult as it is rare.

The more a government strives to curtail freedom of speech, the more obstinately is it resisted; not indeed by the avaricious, ... but by those whom good education, sound morality, and virtue have rendered more free.

He who loves God cannot endeavor that God should love him in return.

The safest way for a state is to lay down the rule that religion is comprised solely in the exercise of charity and justice, and that the rights of rulers in sacred, no less than in secular matters, should merely have to do with actions, but that every man should think what he likes and say what he thinks.

When a man is prey to his emotions, he is not his own master.