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.

That which makes the vanity of others unbearable to us is that which wounds our own.

We are sometimes as different from ourselves as we are from others.

We are never either so fortunate or so misfortunate as we imagine.

Satire is at once the most agreeable and most dangerous of mental qualities. It always pleases when it is refined, but we always fear those who use it too much; yet satire should be allowed when unmixed with spite, and when the person satirized can join in the satire.

Loyalty is in most people only a ruse used by self-interest to attract confidence.

There are no events so disastrous that adroit men do not draw some advantage from them, nor any so fortunate that the imprudent cannot turn to their own prejudice.