Let us not envy some men their accumulated riches; their burden would be too heavy for us; we could not sacrifice, as they do, health, quiet, honor and conscience, to obtain them: It is to pay so dear from them that the bargain is a loss.

All of our unhappiness comes from our inability to be alone.

A man can keep another's secret better than his own. A woman her own better than others.

We perceive when love begins and when it declines by our embarrassment when alone together.

Extremes are vicious, and proceed from men; compensation is just, and proceeds from God.

There are few wives so perfect as not to give their husbands at least once a day good reason to repent of ever having married, or at least of envying those who are unmarried.

We meet With few utterly dull and stupid souls: the sublime and transcendent are still fewer; the generality of mankind stand between these two extremes: the interval is filled with multitudes of ordinary geniuses, but all very useful, and the ornaments and supports of the commonwealth.