It's not our disadvantages or shortcomings that are ridiculous, but rather the studious way we try to hide them, and our desire to act as if they did not exist.

Death is not an evil, because it frees us from all evils, and while it takes away good things, it takes away also the desire for them. Old age is the supreme evil, because it deprives us of all pleasures, leaving us only the appetite for them, and it brings with it all sufferings. Nevertheless, we fear death, and we desire old age.

It's not our disadvantages or shortcomings that are ridiculous, but rather the studious way we try to hide them, and our desire to act as if they did not exist.

I find it awfully difficult to determine if the habit of talking about oneself at length runs contrary to the basic rules of propriety, or if instead the man exempt from this vice is rare.

A dictionary can embrace only a small part of the vast tapestry of a language.

Man is almost always as wicked as his needs require.

There are some centuries which - apart from everything else - in the art and other disciplines presume to remake everything because they know how to make nothing.