There are but three ways for a man to revenge himself of the censure of the world,--to despise it, to return the like, or to endeavor to live so as to avoid it; the first of these is usually pretended, the last is almost impossible, the universal practice is for the second.

If you were not reasoned into your beliefs, you cannot be reasoned out of them.

Imaginary evils soon become real ones by indulging our reflections on them; as he who in a melancholy fancy sees something like a face on the wall or the wainscot can, by two or three touches with a lead pencil, make it look visible, and agreeing with what he fancied.

The affectation of some late authors to introduce and multiply cant words is the most ruinous corruption in any language.

Don't set your wit against a child.

The chameleon, who is said to feed upon nothing but air, has of all animals the nimblest tongue.

Have you not observed that there is a lower kind of discretion and regularity, which seldom fails of raising men to the highest station in the court, the church, and the law?