Let man then contemplate the whole of nature in her full and grand majesty... No idea approaches it. We may enlarge our conceptions beyond all imaginable space; we only produce atoms in comparison with the reality of things. It is an infinite sphere, the center of which is everywhere, the circumference nowhere.

Nothing is more dastardly than to act with bravado toward God.

Those who are clever in imagination are far more pleased with themselves than prudent men could reasonably be.

We do not rest satisfied with the present.... So imprudent we are that we wander in the times which are not ours and do not thinkof the only one which belongs to us; and so idle are we that we dream of those times which are no more and thoughtlessly overlook that which alone exists. For the present is generally painful to us.

Thinking too little about things or thinking too much both make us obstinate and fanatical.

All sorrow has its root in man's inability to sit quiet in a room by himself.

Reason commands us far more imperiously than a master; for in disobeying the one we are unfortunate, and in disobeying the other we are fools.