We are eager to believe that others are flawed because we are eager to believe in what we wish for.

Imagination does not enable us to invent as many different contradictions as there are by nature in every heart.

Time's chariot-wheels make their carriage-road in the fairest face.

Few things are needful to make the wise man happy, but nothing satisfies the fool; - and this is the reason why so many of mankind are miserable.

The passions are the only orators which always persuade.

All our qualities, whether good or bad, are unstable and ambiguous, and almost all are at the mery of chance.

To be a great man it is necessary to know how to profit by the whole of our good fortune.