There is no talent so useful toward rising in the world, or which puts men more out of the reach of fortune, than that quality generally possessed by the dullest sort of men, and in common speech called discretion; a species of lower prudence, by the assistance of which, people of the meanest intellectuals, without any other qualification, pass through the world in great tranquillity, and with universal good treatment, neither giving nor taking offence.

If Heaven had looked upon riches to be a valuable thing, it would not have given them to such a scoundrel.

Bread is the staff of life.

There never appear more than five or six men of genius in an age, but if they were united the world could not stand before them.

How is it possible to expect that mankind will take advice when they will not so much as take warning.

I never saw, heard, nor read, that the clergy were beloved in any nation where Christianity was the religion of the country. Nothing can render them popular, but some degree of persecution.

Don't set your wit against a child.