Worthy or not, my life is my subject, and my subject is my life.

In fact, to gull a fool seems to me an exploit worthy of a witty man.

I have met with some of them - very honest fellows, who, with all their stupidity, had a kind of intelligence and an upright good sense, which cannot be the characteristics of fools.

I have often met with happiness after some imprudent step which ought to have brought ruin upon me, and although passing a vote of censure upon myself I would thank God for his mercy.

I saw that everything famous and beautiful in the world, if we judge by the descriptions and drawings of writers and artists, always loses when we go to see it and examine it closely.

The sweetest pleasures are those which are hardest to be won.

The philosopher is a person who refuses no pleasures which do not produce greater sorrows, and who knows how to create new ones.