It was not reason that besieged Troy; it was not reason that sent forth the Saracen from the desert to conquer the world; that inspired the crusades; that instituted the monastic orders; it was not reason that produced the Jesuits; above all, it was not reason that created the French Revolution. Man is only great when he acts from the passions; never irresistible but when he appeals to the imagination.

Happiness is only to be found in a recurrence to the principles of human nature; and these will prompt very simple measures.

I think that an author who speaks about his own books is almost as bad as a mother who talks about her own children.

The care of the public health is the first duty of the statesman.

Life is too short to be little. You must enlarge your imagination and then act on it.

The affections are the children of ignorance; when the horizon of our experience expands, and models multiply, love and admiration imperceptibly vanish.

I am a Conservative to preserve all that is good in our constitution, a Radical to remove all that is bad. I seek to preserve property and to respect order, and I equally decry the appeal to the passions of the many or the prejudices of the few.