Foolish jokers are thick on the ground, and it rains insects of that sort everywhere. A good joker is a rarity; even a man who is such by nature finds it hard to sustain the part for long; it seldom happens that the man who makes us laugh wins our esteem.

The State not seldom tolerates a comparatively great evil to keep out millions of lesser ills and inconveniences which otherwise would be inevitable and without remedy.

We seek our happiness outside ourselves, and in the opinion of men we know to be flatterers, insincere, unjust, full of envy, caprice and prejudice.

Eloquence is to the sublime what the whole is to the part.

If it be usual to be strongly impressed by things that are scarce, why are we so little impressed by virtue?

The doctors allow one to die, the charlatans kill.

Men blush less for their crimes than for their weaknesses and vanity.