Of the opinions of philosophy I most gladly embrace those that are most solid, that is to say, most human and most our own; my opinions, in conformity with my conduct, are low and humble.

Man is certainly crazy. He could not make a mite, and he makes gods by the dozen.

Wonder is the foundation of all philosophy; research, the progress; ignorance, the end. There is, by heavens, a strong and generous kind of ignorance that yields nothing, for honour and courage, to knowledge: an ignorance to conceive which needs no less knowledge than to conceive knowledge.

One may disavow and disclaim vices that surprise us and whereto our passions transport us. But those which by long habit are rooted in a strong and anchored in a powerful will are not subject to contradiction. Repentance is but a denying of our will, and an opposition of our fantasies, which diverts us here and there.

I leaf through books, I do not study them. What I retain of them is something I no longer recognize as anyone else's.

The confidence in another man's virtue is no light evidence of a man's own, and God willingly favors such a confidence.

Fame and tranquility can never be bedfellows.