Falsehood and delusion are allowed in no case whatever; but, as in the exercise of all the virtues, there is an economy of truth. It is a sort of temperance, by which a man speaks truth with measure, that he may speak it the longer.

Though ugliness be the opposite of beauty, it is not the opposite to proportion and fitness; for it is possible that a thing may be very ugly with any proportions, and with a perfect fitness for any use.

Facts are to the mind what food is to the body.

Flattery corrupts both the receiver and the giver; and adulation is not of more service to the people than to kings.

The most favourable laws can do very little towards the happiness of people when the disposition of the ruling power is adverse to them.

The more accurately we search into the human mind, the stronger traces we everywhere find of his wisdom who made it.

It is in the relaxation of security; it is in the expansion of prosperity; it is in the hour of dilatation of the heart, and of its softening into festivity and pleasure, that the real character of men is discerned.