We confess to little faults only to persuade ourselves we have no great ones.

Magnanimity is sufficiently defined by its name, nevertheless one can say it is the good sense of pride, the most noble way of receiving praise.

We often brag that we are never bored with ourselves, and are so vain as never to think ourselves bad company.

We are always bored by the very people by whom it is vital not to be bored.

Friendship is only a reciprocal conciliation of interests, and an exchange of good offices; it is a species of commerce out of which self-love always expects to gain something.

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

There is real love just as there are real ghosts; every person speaks of it, few persons have seen it.