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

All happiness or unhappiness solely depends upon the quality of the object to which we are attached by love.

If we love something similar to ourselves, we endeavor, as far as we can, to bring it about that it should love us in return.

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.

No matter how thin you slice it, there will always be two sides.

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.

True virtue is life under the direction of reason.