We are not such fools as to pay for reading inferior books, when we can read superior books for nothing.

Vanity calculates but poorly on the vanity of others; what a virtue we should distil from frailty, what a world of pain we should save our brethren, if we would suffer our own weakness to be the measure of theirs.

Nothing is so contagious as enthusiasm.

When the soul communes with itself the lip is silent.

Certain I am that every author who has written a book with earnest forethought and fondly cherished designs will bear testimony to the fact that much which he meant to convey has never been guessed at in any review of his work; and many a delicate beauty of thought, on which he principally valued himself, remains, like the statue of Isis, an image of truth from which no hand lifts the veil.

The easiest person to deceive is one's self.

The fewer blows, the better. Brave men fight if they must; wise men never fight if they can help it.