I see men ordinarily more eager to discover a reason for things than to find out whether the things are so.

My errors are by now natural and incorrigible; but the good that worthy men do the public by making themselves imitable, I shall perhaps do by making myself evitable.

The memory represents to us not what we choose but what it pleases.

Obstinacy and dogmatism are the surest signs of stupidity. Is there anything more confident, resolute, disdainful, grave and serious than an ass?

There is no course of life so weak and sottish as that which is managed by order, method, and discipline.

Behold the hands, how they promise, conjure, appeal, menace, pray, supplicate, refuse, beckon, interrogate, admire, confess, cringe, instruct, command, mock and what not besides, with a variation and multiplication of variation which makes the tongue envious.

Judgement can do without knowledge: but not knowledge without judgement.