It is hard to say which is the greatest fool: he who tells the whole truth, or he who tells no truth at all. Character is as necessary in business as in trade. No man can deceive often in either.

We are really so prejudiced by our educations, that, as the ancients deified their heroes, we deify their madmen.

If you would convince others, seem open to conviction yourself.

A man who owes a little can clear it off in a very little time, and, if he is a prudent man, will; whereas a man, who by long negligence, owes a great deal, despairs of ever being able to pay, and therefore never looks into his accounts at all.

Choose your pleasures for yourself, and do not let them be imposed upon you.

Men are apt to mistake, or at least to seem to mistake, their own talents, in hopes, perhaps, of misleading others to allow them that which they are conscious they do not possess. Thus lord Hardwicke valued himself more upon being a great minister of state, which he certainly was not, than upon being a great magistrate, which he certainly was.

A young fellow ought to be wiser than he should seem to be; and an old fellow ought to seem wise whether he really be so or not.