The mind will ever be unstable that has only prejudices to rest on.

The more equality there is established among men, the more virtue and happiness will reign in society.

Slavery to monarchs and ministers, which the world will be long freeing itself from, and whose deadly grasp stops the progress of the human mind, is not yet abolished.

Learn from me, if not by my precepts, then by my example, how dangerous is the pursuit of knowledge and how much happier is that man who believes his native town to be the world than he who aspires to be greater than his nature will allow.

...men endeavor to sink us still lower, merely to render us alluring objects for a moment; and women, intoxicated by the adoration which men, under the influence of their senses, pay them, do not seek to obtain a durable interest in their hearts, or to become the friends of the fellow creatures who find amusement in their society.

I begin to love this little creature, and to anticipate his birth as a fresh twist to a knot, which I do not wish to untie.

The appetites will rule if the mind is vacant.