Weakness is the only fault that is incorrigible.

When fortune surprises us by giving us some great office without having gradually led us to expect it, or without having raised our hopes, it is well nigh impossible to occupy it well, and to appear worthy to fill it.

We often pay our debts not because it is only fair that we should, but to make future loans easier.

If one judges love according to the greatest part of the effects it produces, it would appear to resemble rather hatred than kindness.

The praise we give to new comers into the world arises from the envy we bear to those who are established.

What we take for virtue is often nothing but an assemblage of different actions, and of different interests, that fortune or our industry knows how to arrange.

The evil that we do does not attract to us so much persecution and hatred as our good qualities.