I remember the very thing that I do not wish to; I cannot forget the things I wish to forget.

Nothing contributes to the entertainment of the reader more, than the change of times and the vicissitudes of fortune.

Friendship is not to be sought for its wages, but because its revenue consists entirely in the love which it implies.

Just what is the civil law? What neither influence can affect, nor power break, nor money corrupt: were it to be suppressed or even merely ignored or inadequately observed, no one would feel safe about anything, whether his own possessions, the inheritance he expects from his father, or the bequests he makes to his children.

I prefer the wisdom of the uneducated to the folly of the loquacious.

Orators are most vehement when their cause is weak.

Whatever is done without ostentation, and without the people being witnesses of it, is, in my opinion, most praiseworthy: not that the public eye should be entirely avoided, for good actions desire to be placed in the light; but notwithstanding this, the greatest theater for virtue is conscience.