I look upon indolence as a sort of suicide; for the man is effectually destroyed, though the appetites of the brute may survive.

Statesmen and beauties are very rarely sensible of the gradations of their decay.

People will no more advance their civility to a bear, than their money to a bankrupt.

If you will please people, you must please them in their own way; and as you cannot make them what they should be, you must take them as they are.

Manners must adorn knowledge and smooth its way in the world, without them it is like a great rough diamond, very well in a closet by way of curiosity, and also for its intrinsic value; but most prized when polished.

Without some dissimulation no business can be carried on at all.

Let your enemies be disarmed by the gentleness of your manner, but let them feel at the same time the steadiness of your just resentment for there is a great difference between bearing malice, which is always ungenerous, and a resolute self-defense which is ever prudent and justifiable.