We endeavor to make a virtue of the faults we are unwilling to correct.

What often prevents our abandoning ourselves to a single vice is, our having more than one.

We come altogether fresh and raw into the several stages of life, and often find ourselves without experience, despite our years.

The courage of a great many men, and the virtue of a great many women, are the effect of vanity, shame, and especially a suitabletemperament.

Moral severity in women is only a dress or paint which they use to set off their beauty.

Some good qualities are like the senses: Those who are entirely deprived of them can have no notion of them.

Confidence always pleases those who receive it. It is a tribute we pay to their merit, a deposit we commit to their trust, a pledge that gives them a claim upon us, a kind of dependence to which we voluntarily submit.