All I can say, in answer to this kind queries [of friends] is that I have not the distemper called the Plague; but that I have allthe plagues of old age, and of a shattered carcase.

I would have all intoleration intolerated in its turn.

Few fathers care much for their sons, or at least, most of them care more for their money. Of those who really love their sons, few know how to do it.

Cultivate the habit of thinking ahead, and of anticipating the necessary and immediate consequences of all your actions.... Likewise in your pleasures, ask yourself what such and such an amusement leads to, as it is essential to have an objective in everything you do. Any pastime that contributes nothing to bodily strength or to mental alertness is a totally ridiculous, not to say, idiotic, pleasure.

Everything is worth seeing once, and the more one sees the less one either wonders or admires.

In matters of religion and matrimony I never give any advice; because I will not have anybody's torments in this world or the next laid to my charge.

There is a sort of veteran women of condition, who, having lived always in the grand mode, and having possibly had some gallantries, together with the experience of five and twenty or thirty years, form a young fellow better than all the rules that can be given him.