We love everything on our own account; we even follow our own taste and inclination when we prefer our friends to ourselves; and yet it is this preference alone that constitutes true and perfect friendship.

It appears that nature has hid at the bottom of our hearts talents and abilities unknown to us. It is only the passions that have the power of bringing them to light, and sometimes give us views more true and more perfect than art could possibly do.

When we exaggerate our friends' tenderness towards us, it is often less from gratitude than from a desire to exhibit our own virtue.

Consolation for unhappiness can often be found in a certain satisfaction we get from looking unhappy.

Though nature be ever so generous, yet can she not make a hero alone. Fortune must contribute her part too; and till both concur, the work cannot be perfected.

Hope and fear are inseparable. There is no hope without fear, nor any fear without hope.

All the passions make us commit faults; love makes us commit the most ridiculous ones.