Love is nothing but joy accompanied with the idea of an eternal cause.

Philosophy has no end in view save truth; faith looks for nothing but obedience and piety.

I have made a ceaseless effort not to ridicule, not to bewail, not to scorn human actions, but to understand them.

If anyone conceives that he is loved by another, and believes that he has given no cause for such love, he will love that other in return.

Everything excellent is as difficult as it is rare.

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.

It may easily come to pass that a vain man may become proud and imagine himself pleasing to all when he is in reality a universal nuisance.