Human brutes, like other beasts, find snares and poison in the provision of life, and are allured by their appetites to their destruction.

Old sciences are unraveled like old stockings, by beginning at the foot.

Perpetual aiming at wit is a very bad part of conversation. It is done to support a character: it generally fails; it is a sort of insult on the company, and a restraint upon the speaker.

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

The most ignorant person, at a reasonable charge, and with a little bodily labour, might write books in philosophy, poetry, politics, laws, mathematics, and theology, without the least assistance from genius or study.

It is as hard to satirize well a man of distinguished vices, as to praise well a man of distinguished virtues.

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.