Our own interests are still an exquisite means for dazzling our eyes agreeably.

Let each of us examine his thoughts; he will find them wholly concerned with the past or the future. We almost never think of the present, and if we do think of it, it is only to see what light is throws on our plans for the future. The present is never our end. The past and the present are our means, the future alone our end. Thus we never actually live, but hope to live, and since we are always planning how to be happy, it is inevitable that we should never be so.

It is not in Montaigne, but in myself, that I find all that I see in him.

All the miseries of mankind come from one thing, not knowing how to remain alone.

I maintain that, if everyone knew what others said about him, there would not be four friends in the world.

Nothing is thoroughly approved but mediocrity. The majority has established this, and it fixes its fangs on whatever gets beyond it either way.

There are three means of believing--by inspiration, by reason, and by custom. Christianity, which is the only rational institution, does yet admit none for its sons who do not believe by inspiration. Nor does it injure reason or custom, or debar them of their proper force; on the contrary, it directs us to open our minds by the proofs of the former, and to confirm our minds by the authority of the latter.