My atheism, like that of Spinoza, is true piety towards the universe and denies only gods fashioned by men in their own image, to be servants of their human interests.

Wisdom lies in taking everything with good humor and a grain of salt.

It is one thing to lack a heart and another to possess eyes and a just imagination.

It is a new road to happiness, if you have strength enough to castigate a little the various impulses that sway you in turn.

The fact of having been born is a bad augury for immortality.

Every nation thinks its own madness normal and requisite; more passion and more fancy it calls folly, less it calls imbecility.

In unphilosophical minds any rare or unexpected thing excites wonder, while in philosophical minds the familiar excites wonder also.