Friendship is a serious affection; the most sublime of all affections, because it is founded on principle, and cemented by time.

A king is always a king - and a woman always a woman: his authority and her sex ever stand between them and rational converse

How frequently has melancholy and even misanthropy taken possession of me, when the world has disgusted me, and friends have proven unkind. I have then considered myself as a particle broken off from the grand mass of mankind.

And this homage to women's attractions has distorted their understanding tosuch an extent that almost all the civilized women of the present century are anxious only to inspire love, when they ought to have the nobler aim of getting respect for their abilities and virtues.

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.

... wealth and female softness equally tend to debase mankind!

Virtue can only flourish among equals.