To despise our own species is the price we must often pay for knowledge of it.

The French have a saying that whatever excellence a man may exhibit in a public station he is very apt to be ridiculous in a private one.

Too high an appreciation of our own talents is the chief cause why experience preaches to us all in vain.

Examinations are formidable even to the best prepared, for the greatest fool may ask more than the wisest man can answer.

Knowledge is two-fold, and consists not only in an affirmation of what is true, but in the negation of that which is false.

Many speak the truth when they say that they despise riches, but they mean the riches possessed by others.

He that knows himself, knows others; and he that is ignorant of himself, could not write a very profound lecture on other men's heads.