We fight to great disadvantage when we fight with those who have nothing to lose.

Like other men, I have sought honours and preferment, and often have obtained them beyond my wishes or hopes. Yet never have I found in them that content which I had figured beforehand in my mind. A strong reason, if we well consider it, why we should disencumber ourselves of vain desires.

Waste no time with revolutions that do not remove the causes of your complaints but simply change the faces of those in charge.

I know no man who feels deeper disgust than I do at the ambition, avarice, and profligacy of the priesthood, as well because every one of these vices is odious in itself, as because each of them separately and all of them together are utterly abhorrent in men making profession of a life dedicated to God.

Affairs that depend on many rarely succeed.

It is a great matter to be in authority over others; for authority, if it be rightly used, will make you feared beyond your actual resources.

By numberless examples it will evidently appear that human affairs are as subject to change and fluctuation as the waters of the sea agitated by the winds.