The power of applying attention, steady and undissipated, to a single object, is the sure mark of superior genius.

Let them show me a cottage where there are not the same vices of which they accuse the courts.

A foreign minister, I will maintain it, can never be a good man of business if he is not an agreeable man of pleasure too. Half his business is done by the help of his pleasures: his views are carried on, and perhaps best, and most unsuspectedly, at balls, suppers, assemblies, and parties of pleasure; by intrigues with women, and connections insensibly formed with men, at those unguarded hours of amusement.

Gold and silver are but merchandise, as well as cloth or linen; and that nation that buys the least, and sells the most, must always have the most money.

Sex: the pleasure is momentary, the position ridiculous, and the expense damnable.

Most people enjoy the inferiority of their best friends.

I am not of the opinion generally entertained in this country [England], that man lives by Greek and Latin alone; that is, by knowing a great many words of two dead languages, which nobody living knows perfectly, and which are of no use in the common intercourse of life. Useful knowledge, in my opinion, consists of modern languages, history, and geography; some Latin may be thrown into the bargain, in compliance with custom, and for closet amusement.