I shall consider human actions and desires in exactly the same manner, as though I were concerned with lines, planes and solids.

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

He who seeks to regulate everything by law is more likely to arouse vices than to reform them. It is best to grant what cannot be abolished, even though it be in itself harmful. How many evils spring from luxury, envy, avarice, drunkenness and the like, yet these are tolerated because they cannot be prevented by legal enactments.

Nothing in nature is by chance... Something appears to be chance only because of our lack of knowledge.

I shall consider human actions and desires in exactly the same manner, as though I were concerned with lines, planes and solids.

I have resolved to demonstrate by a certain and undoubted course of argument, or to deduce from the very condition of human nature, not what is new and unheard of, but only such things as agree best with practice.

To give aid to every poor man is far beyond the reach and power of every man. Care of the poor is incumbent on society as a whole.