When I consider the wonderful activity of the mind, so great a memory of what is past, and such a capacity of penetrating into the future: when I behold such a number of arts and sciences, and such a multitude of discoveries hence arising,--I believe and am firmly persuaded that a nature which contains so many things within itself cannot be mortal.

It is easy to distinguish between the joking that reflects good breeding and that which is coarse-the one, if aired at an apposite moment of mental relaxation, is becoming in the most serious of men, whereas the other is unworthy of any free person, if the content is indecent or the expression obscene.

It is not only arrogant, but it is profligate, for a man to disregard the world's opinion of himself.

Virtue is a habit of the mind, consistent with nature and moderation and reason.

Summer lasts not for ever; seasons succeed each other.

Do not hold the delusion that your advancement is accomplished by crushing others.

Death is not natural for a state as it is for a human being, for whom death is not only necessary, but frequently even desirable.