The true character of epistolary style is playfulness and urbanity.

Know that morality is a curb, not a spur.

A part of kindness consists in loving people more than they deserve.

Virtue is the health of the soul. It gives a flavor to the smallest leaves of life.

There is in the soul a taste for the good, just as there is in the body an appetite for enjoyment.

Attention is like a narrow mouthed vessel; pour into it what you have to say cautiously, and, as it were, drop by drop.

A few words worthy to be remembered suffice to give an idea of a great mind. There are single thoughts that contain the essence of a whole volume, single sentences that have the beauties of a large work, a simplicity so finished and so perfect that it equals in merit and in excellence a large and glorious composition.