We often pay our debts not because it is only fair that we should, but to make future loans easier.

It is oftener by the estimation of our own feelings that we exaggerate the good qualities of others than by their merit, and when we praise them we wish to attract their praise.

Friendship is a traffic wherein self-love always proposes to be the gainer.

Honest people will respect us for our merit: the public, for our luck.

Nothing is rarer than real goodness.

It is difficult to define love; all we can say is, that in the soul it is a desire to rule, in the mind it is a sympathy, and in the body it is a hidden and delicate wish to possess what we love-Plus many mysteries.

In friendship, as in love, we are often more happy from the things we are ignorant of than from those we are acquainted with.