Love and desire are the spirit's wings to great deeds.

Our passions are the true phoenixes; when the old one is burnt out, a new one rises from its ashes.

One can stand anything except a succession of ordinary days

In society every man is taken for what he gives himself out to be; but he must give himself out to be something. Better to be slightly disagreeable than altogether insignificant.

Hatred is partial, but love is still more so.

When I consider the narrow limits within which our active and inquiring faculties are confined; when I see how all our energies are wasted in providing for mere necessities, which again have no further end than to prolong a wretched existence; and then that all our satisfaction concerning certain subjects of investigation ends in nothing better than a passive resignation... when I consider all this... I am silent.

People always fancy that we must become old to become wise; but, in truth, as years advance, it is hard to keep ourselves as wise as we were.