For what are the triumphs of war, planned by ambition, executed by violence, and consummated by devastation? The means are the sacrifice of many, the end, the bloated aggrandizement of the few.

Some reputed saints that have been canonized ought to have been cannonaded.

It is curious that we pay statesmen for what they say, not for what they do; and judge of them from what they do, not from what they say. Hence they have one code of maxims for profession and another for practice, and make up their consciences as the Neapolitans do their beds, with one set of furniture for show and another for use.

That profound firmness which enabler a man to regard difficulties but as evils to be surmounted, no matter what shape they may assume.

Most men know what they hate, few what they love.

There are circumstances of peculiar difficulty and danger, where a mediocrity of talent is the most fatal quantum that a man can possibly possess. Had Charles the First and Louis the Sixteenth been more wise or more weak, more firm or more yielding, in either case they had both of them saved their heads.

Some are cursed with the fullness of satiety; and how can they bear the ills of life when its very pleasures fatigue them?