The generality of virtuous women are like hidden treasures, they are safe only because nobody has sought after them.

To establish oneself in the world, one does all one can to seem established there already.

Praise is flattery, artful, hidden, delicate, which gratifies differently him who praises and him who is praised. The one takes it as the reward of merit, the other bestows it to show his impartiality and knowledge.

Usually we praise only to be praised.

We may seem great in an employment below our worth, but we very often look little in one that is too big for us.

Great men's honor ought always to be measured by the methods they made use of in attaining it.

A weak mind is the only defect out of our power to mend.