Learned we may be with another man's learning: we can only be wise with wisdom of our own.

Our skin is provided as adequately as theirs with endurance against the assaults of the weather: witness so many nations who have not yet tried the use of any clothes. Our ancient Gauls wore hardly any clothes; nor do the Irish, our neighbors, under so cold a sky.

Nature is a gentle guide, but not more sweet and gentle than prudent and just.

There is no knowledge so hard to acquire as the knowledge of how to live this life well and naturally.

Such as are in immediate fear of a losing their estates, of banishment, or of slavery, live in perpetual anguish, and lose all appetite and repose; whereas such as are actually poor, slaves, or exiles, ofttimes live as merrily as other folk.

Philosophical discussions habitually make men happy and joyful not frowning and sad.

It is for little souls, that truckle under the weight of affairs, not to know how clearly to disengage themselves, and not to know how to lay them aside and take them up again.