A wise man thinks it more advantageous not to join the battle than to win.

There are few occasions when we should make a bad bargain by giving up the good on condition that no ill was said of us.

Avarice is more opposite to economy than liberality.

We sometimes imagine we hate flattery, but we only hate the way we are flattered.

Funeral pomp is more for the vanity of the living than for the honor of the dead.

Almost everyone takes pleasure in repaying trifling obligations, very many feel gratitude for those that are moderate; but there is scarcely anyone who is not ungrateful for those that are weighty.

Things often offer themselves to our mind in a more finished form in the very first thought, than we might have made them by muchart and study.