One promises much, to avoid giving little.

We have neither the strength nor the opportunity to accomplish all the good and all the evil which we design.

The generality of men are so bound within the sphere of their circumstances that they have not even the courage to get out of them through their ideas, and if we see a few whom, in a way, speculation over great things makes incapable of mean ones, we find still more with whom the practice of small things takes away the feeling for great ones.

Children are taught to fear and obey; the avarice, pride, or timidity of parents teaches children economy, arrogance, or submission. They are also encouraged to be imitators, a course to which they are already only too much inclined. No one thinks of making them original, courageous, independent.

The law cannot equalize mankind in spite of nature.

You are not born for fame if you don't know the value of time.

It is a great sign of mediocrity to praise always moderately.