The two Antonines (for it is of them that we are now speaking) governed the Roman world forty-two years, with the same invariable spirit of wisdom and virtue. ... Their united reigns are possibly the only period of history in which the happiness of a great people was the sole object of government.

But a wild democracy . . . too often disdains the essential principles of justice.

It has been sagaciously conjectured, that the artful legislator indulged the stubborn prejudices of his countrymen.

Where error is irreparable, repentance is useless.

But [the Arabs'] friendship was venal, their faith inconstant, their enmity capricious: it was an easier task to excite than to disarm these roving barbarians; and, in the familiar intercourse of war, they learned to see, and to despise, the splendid weakness both of Rome and of Persia.

The patient and active virtues of a soldier are insensibly nursed in the habits and discipline of a pastoral life.

The science of the laws is the slow growth of time and experience.