To possess taste, one must have some soul.

The favorites of fortune or of fame topple from their pedestals before our eyes without diverting us from ambition.

Those who can bear all can dare all.

The common excuse for those bringing misfortune on others is that they desire their good.

The character of false wit is that of appearing to depend only upon reason.

The maxim that men are not to be praised before their death was invented by envy and too lightly adopted by philosophers.

All that causes one man to differ from another is a very slight thing. What is it that is the origin of beauty or ugliness, health or weakness, ability or stupidity? A slight difference in the organs, a little more or a little less bile. Yet this more or less is of infinite importance to men; and when they think otherwise they are mistaken.