Among the wealthy, generosity is often merely a kind of shyness.

Undeserved praise causes more pangs of conscience later than undeserved blame, but probably only for this reason, that our power of judgment are more completely exposed by being over praised than by being unjustly underestimated.

The purpose of criminal law is to punish the enemies of those in power.

Pity is the most pleasant feeling in those who have not much pride and have no prospect of great conquests; for them the easy prey - and that is what all who suffer are - is enchanting.

Man alone resists the direction of gravitation: he constantly wants to fall--upwards.

Precisely this is godliness--that there are gods, but no God.

Because men really respect only that which was founded of old and has developed slowly, he who wants to live on after his death must take care not only of his posterity but even more of his past.