Complaisance, though in itself it be scarce reckoned in the number of moral virtues, is that which gives a lustre to every talent a man can be possessed of. It was Plato's advice to an unpolished writer that he should sacrifice to the graces. In the same manner I would advise every man of learning, who would not appear in the world a mere scholar or philosopher, to make himself master of the social virtue which I have here mentioned.

Those Marriages generally abound most with Love and Constancy, that are preceded by a long Courtship.

All well-regulated families set apart an hour every morning for tea and bread and butter

The greatest parts, without discretion as observed by an elegant writer, may be fatal to their owner; as Polyphemus, deprived of his eyes, was only the more exposed on account of his enormous strength and stature.

Others proclaim the infirmities of a great man with satisfaction and complacence, if they discover none of the like in themselves.

Devotion, when it does not lie under the check of reason, is apt to degenerate into enthusiasm.

I never knew a critic who made it his business to lash the faults of other writers that was not guilty of greater himself--as the hangman is generally a worse malefactor than the criminal that suffers by his hand.