Philosophy is a goddess, whose head indeed is in heaven, but whose feet are upon earth; she attempts more than she accomplishes, and promises more than she performs.

Many books owe their success to the good memories of their authors and the bad memories of their readers.

That writer does the most who gives his reader the most knowledge and takes from him the least time.

Time,- that black and narrow isthmus between two eternities.

Vanity finds in self-love so powerful an ally that it storms, as it were, by a coup de main,, the citadel of our heads, where, having blinded the two watchmen, it readily descends into the heart.

War is a game in which princes seldom win, the people never.

Cheerfulness ought to be the viaticum vitae of their life to the old; age without cheerfulness is a Lapland winter without a sun.