He that can please nobody is not so much to be pitied as he that nobody can please.

There are two principles of established acceptance in morals; first, that self-interest is the mainspring of all of our actions, and secondly, that utility is the test of their value.

In answering an opponent, arrange your ideas, but not your words.

I have somewhere seen it observed that we should make the same use of a book that the bee does of a flower: she steals sweets from it, but does not injure it.

The man of pleasure, by a vain attempt to be more happy than any man can be, is often more miserable than most men are.

We should have a glorious conflagration, if all who cannot put fire into their works would only consent to put their works into the fire.

The pride of ancestry is a superstructure of the most imposing height, but resting on the most flimsy foundation. It is ridiculous enough to observe the hauteur with which the old nobility look down on the new. The reason of this puzzled me a little, until I began to reflect that most titles are respectable only because they are old; if new, they would be despised, because all those who now admire the grandeur of the stream would see nothing but the impurity of the source.