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

Laws which can be broken without any wrong to one's neighbor are a laughing-stock; and such laws, instead of restraining the appetites and lusts of mankind, serve rather to heighten them. Nitimur in vetitum semper, cupimusque negata [we always resist prohibitions, and yearn for what is denied us].

None are more taken in by flattery than the proud, who wish to be the first and are not.

For peace is not mere absence of war, but is a virtue that springs from force of character: for obedience is the constant will to execute what, by the general decree of the commonwealth, ought to be done.

Nature is satisfied with little; and if she is, I am also.

Surely human affairs would be far happier if the power in men to be silent were the same as that to speak.

Fear cannot be without hope nor hope without fear.