We should seek the truth without hesitation; and, if we refuse it, we show that we value the esteem of men more than the search for truth.

The last thing we decide in writing a book is what to put first.

Not to be mad is another form of madness

All who say the same things do not possess them in the same manner; and hence the incomparable author of the Art of Conversation pauses with so much care to make it understood that we must not judge of the capacity of a man by the excellence of a happy remark that we heard him make. Let us penetrate, says he, the mind from which it proceeds. It will oftenest be seen that he will be made to disavow it on the spot, and will be drawn very far from this better thought in which he does not believe, to plunge himself into another, quite base and ridiculous.

If you believe in God you are at no disadvantage in this life, and at considerable advantage in the next. If you do not believe, but find in the next that there was a next, you are most unfortunate!

There is enough light for those who only desire to see, and enough obscurity for those who have a contrary disposition

Nothing is surer than that the people will be weak.