Having been unable to strengthen justice, we have justified strength.

The consciousness of the falsity of present pleasures, and the ignorance of the vanity of absent pleasures, cause inconstancy.

If you want others to have a good opinion of you, say nothing.

We must kill them in war, just because they live beyond the river. If they lived on this side, we would be called murderers.

Curiosity is nothing more than vanity. More often than not we only seek knowledge to show it off.

True eloquence scorns eloquence.

There are vices which have no hold upon us, but in connection with others; and which, when you cut down the trunk, fall like the branches.