If a man knows where to get good advice, it is as though he could supply it himself.

I could never have known so well how paltry men are, and how little they care for really high aims, if I had not tested them by my scientific researches. Thus I saw that most men only care for science so far as they get a living by it, and that they worship even error when it affords them a subsistence.

Change amuses the mind, but rarely profits.

What men usually say of misfortunes, that they never come alone, may with equal truth be said of good fortune; nay, of other circumstances which gather round us in a harmonious way, whether it arise from a kind of fatality, or that man has the power of attracting to himself things that are mutually related.

One mind is enough for a thousand hands.

I hate every violent overthrow, because as much is destroyed as is gained by it.

When she sees the leaves fall, they raise no other idea in her mind than that winter is approaching.