Revenge is a kind of wild justice, which the more a man's nature runs to, the more ought law to weed it out.

The cause and root of nearly all evils in the sciences is this-that while we falsely admire and extol the powers of the human mind we neglect to seek for its true helps.

A principal fruit of friendship, is the ease and discharge of the fullness and swellings of the heart, which passions of all kinds do cause and induce.

As is the garden such is the gardener. A man's nature runs either to herbs or weeds.

I paint for myself. I don't know how to do anything else, anyway. Also I have to earn my living, and occupy myself.

A forbidden writing is thought to be a certain spark of truth, that flies up in the face of them who seek to tread it out.

The human understanding is no dry light, but receives an infusion from the will and affections... What a man had rather were true he more readily believes.