Gratitude is a soil on which joy thrives.

What will people say-in these words lies the tyranny of the world, the whole destruction of our natural disposition, the oblique vision of our minds. These four words hold sway everywhere.

People look with sympathetic eyes only at the blossom and the fruit, and disregard the long period of transition during which the one is ripening into the other.

When the foot of the' mountain is enveloped in mist, the mountain appears to us much loftier than it is; so also when the ground and basis of a disaster is not clear to us.

Only he is free who cultivates his own thoughts and strives without fear to do justice to them.

Truly, one gets easier accustomed to a silken bed than to a sack of leaves.

To acquire money requires valor, to keep money requires prudence, and to spend money well is an art.