The good or the bad fortune of men depends not less upon their own dispositions than upon fortune.

Considering how little the beginning or the ceasing to love is in our own power, it is foolish and unreasonable for the lover or his mistress to complain of one another's inconstancy.

Envy is more irreconcilable than hatred.

Those whom the world has delighted to honor have oftener been influenced in their doings by ambition and vanity than by patriotism.

The moderation of men in the most exalted fortunes is a desire to be thought above those things that have raised them so high.

Self-love is the love of a man's own self, and of everything else for his own sake. It makes people idolaters to themselves, and tyrants to all the world besides.

All the passions are nothing else than different degrees of heat and cold of the blood.