A man's happiness or unhappiness depends as much on his temperament as on his destiny.

We do not despise all those who have vices, but we do despise those that have no virtue.

The secret of pleasing in conversation is not to explain too much everything; to say them half and leave a little for divination is a mark of the good opinion we have of others, and nothing flatters their self-love more.

Of all our faults, the one we avow most easily is idleness; we persuade ourselves that it is allied to all the peaceable virtues,and as for the others, that it does not destroy them utterly, but only suspends the exercise of their functions.

There is at least as much eloquence in the voice, eyes, and air of a speaker as in his choice of words.

Treachery is more often the effect of weakness than of a formed design.

A man of understanding finds less difficulty in submitting to a wrong-headed fellow, than in attempting to set him right.