Men would not live in society long if they were not each others dupes.

On why I don't trust democracy without extremely powerful systems of accountability and recall What seems to be generosity is often only disguised ambition - which despises small interests to gain great ones.

We are never so easily deceived as when we imagine we are deceiving others.

We are never so ridiculous through what we are as through what we pretend to be.

The health of the soul is something we can be no more sure of than that of the body; and though a man may seem far from the passions, yet he is in as much danger of falling into them as one in a perfect state of health of having a fit of sickness.

Even the most disinterested love is, after all, but a kind of bargain, in which self-love always proposes to be the gainer one wayor another.

Politeness of mind consists in thinking chaste and refined thoughts.