A man who has cured himself of all ridiculous prepossessions, and is fully, sincerely, and steadily convinced, from experience as well as philosophy, that the difference of fortune makes less difference in happiness than is vulgarly imagined; such a one does not measure out degrees of esteem according to the rent-rolls of his acquaintance. ... his internal sentiments are more regulated by the personal characters of men, than by the accidental and capricious favors of fortune.

If ... the past may be no Rule for the future, all Experience becomes useless and can give rise to no Inferences or Conclusions.

Anything that is conceivable is possible.

Custom is the great guide to human life.

Liberty of any kind is never lost all at once.

All knowledge resolves itself into probability. ... In every judgment, which we can form concerning probability, as well as concerning knowledge, we ought always to correct the first judgment deriv'd from the nature of the object, by another judgment, deriv'd from the nature of the understanding.

I never asserted such an absurd thing as that things arise without a cause.