Self-interest speaks all manner of tongues and plays all manner of parts, even that of disinterestedness.

The only thing that should astonish us is that anything can yet astonish us.

Humility is the sure evidence of Christian virtues. Without it, we retain all our faults still, and they are only covered over with pride, which hides them from other men's observation, and sometimes from our own too.

Sincerity is an openness of heart; we find it in very few people; what we usually see is only an artful dissimulation to win the confidence of others.

The grace of novelty and the length of habit, though so very opposite to one another, yet agree in this, that they both alike keepus from discovering the faults of our friends.

We can be more clever than one, but not more clever than all.

Sometimes accidents happen in life from which we have need of a little madness to extricate ourselves successfully