Simplicity is the great friend to nature, and if I would be proud of anything in this silly world, it should be of this honest alliance.

An atheist is more reclaimable than a papist, as ignorance is sooner cured than superstition.

Pain and pleasure, like light and darkness, succeed each other; and he that knows how to accommodate himself to their periodical returns, and can wisely extract the good from the evil, knows only how to live: this is true contentment, at least all that is to be had of it in this world; and for this every man must be indebted not to his fortune, but to himself.

How frequently is the honesty and integrity of a man disposed of by a smile or shrug! How many good and generous actions have been sunk into oblivion by a distrustful look, or stamped With the imputation of proceeding from bad motives, by a mysterious and seasonable whisper!

If time, like money, could be laid by while one was not using it, there might be some excuse for the idleness of half of the world, but yet not a full one. For even this would be such an economy as the living on a principal sum, without making it purchase interest.

Is this a fit time, said my father to himself, to talk of Pensions and Grenadiers?

Before an affliction is digested, consolation ever comes too soon; and after it is digested, it comes too late.