There are male as well as female gossips.

Those graces which from their presumed facility encourage all to attempt an imitation of them, are usually the most inimitable.

Sleep, the type of death, is also, like that which it typifies, restricted to the earth. It flies from hell and is excluded from heaven.

None are so seldom found alone, and are so soon tired of their own company, as those coxcombs who are on the best terms with themselves.

In all places, and in all times, those religionists who have believed too much have been more inclined to violence and persecution than those who have believed too little.

A wise minister would rather preserve peace than gain a victory, because he knows that even the most successful war leaves nations generally more poor, always more profligate, than it found them.

Nothing more completely baffles one who is full of trick and duplicity than straigthforward and simple integrity in another. A knave would rather quarrel with a brother knave than with a fool, but he would rather avoid a quarrel with one honest man than with both. He can combat a fool by management and address, and he can conquer a knave by temptations. But the honest man is neither to be bamboozled nor bribed.