Wise people may say what they will, but one passion is never cured by another.

Spirit is now a very fashionable word: to act with Spirit, to speak with Spirit, means only to act rashly, and to talk indiscreetly. An able man shows his Spirit by gentle words and resolute actions; he is neither hot nor timid.

Keep carefully not of all scrapes and quarrels. They lower a character extremely; and are particularly dangerous in France, wherea man is dishonoured by not resenting an affront, and utterly ruined by resenting it.

When griefs are genuine, I find, there is nothing more vacuous, more burdensome, or even more impertinent, than letters of consolation.

Nothing sharpens the arrow of sarcasm so keenly as the courtesy that polishes it; no reproach is like that we clothe with a smile and present with a bow.

Talk often, but never long; in that case, if you do not please, at least you are sure not to tire your hearers. Pay your own reckoning, but do not treat the whole company; this being one of the few cases in which people do not care to be treated, every one being fully convinced that he has wherewithal to pay.

The world is a country which nobody ever yet knew by description; one must travel through it one's self to be acquainted with it.