Death, like the sun, cannot be looked at steadily.

No matter how brilliant an action, it should not be considered great unless it was the result of a great motive.

There are few people who are more often in the wrong than those who cannot endure to be so.

What is called generosity is usually only the vanity of giving; we enjoy the vanity more than the thing given.

Were we perfectly acquainted with the object, we should never passionately desire it.

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

Idleness and constancy fix the mind to what it finds easy and agreeable. This habit always confines and cramps up our knowledge; and no one has ever taken the trouble to stretch and carry his understanding as far as it could go.