The mind, like all other things, will become impaired, the sciences are its food,--they nourish, but at the same time they consume it.

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

It is virtue which should determine us in the choice of our friends, without inquiring into their good or evil fortune.

A man who is free and unmarried, if he has some intelligence, can rise above his fortune, mingle in society and meet the best people on an equal footing. This is harder for a married man: marriage, it seems, confines every man to his proper rank.

One should never risk a joke, even of the mildest and most unexceptional charters, except among people of culture and wit.

Piety with some people, but especially with women, is either a passion, or an infirmity of age, or a fashion which must be followed.

A man must have very eminent qualities to hold his own without being polite.