What a strange vanity painting is; it attracts admiration by resembling the original, we do not admire.

Man is clearly made to think. It is his whole dignity and his whole merit; and his whole duty is to think as he ought. And the order of thought is to begin with ourselves, and with our Author and our end.

It is your own assent to yourself, and the constant voice of your own reason, and not of others, that should make you believe.

The origins of disputes between philosophers is, that one class of them have undertaken to raise man by displaying his greatness, and the other to debase him by showing his miseries.

You always admire what you really don't understand.

Since we cannot be universal and know all that is to be known of everything, we ought to know a little about everything. For it is far better to know something about everything than to know all about one thing. This universality is the best. If we can have both, still better; but if we must choose, we ought to choose the former.

Once your soul has been enlarged by a truth, it can never return to its original size.