For table-talk, I prefer the pleasant and witty before the learned and the grave; in bed, beauty before goodness.

To die is not to play a part in society; it is the act of a single person. Let us live and laugh among our friends; let us die and sulk among strangers.

I admire the assurance and confidence everyone has in himself, whereas there is hardly anything I am sure I know or that I dare give my word I can do.

Those who give the first shock to a state are the first overwhelmed in its ruin; the fruits of public commotion are seldom enjoyed by him who was the first mover; he only beats the water for another's net.

Give me the provisions and whole apparatus of a kitchen, and I would starve.

Example is a bright looking-glass, universal and for all shapes to look into.

Men throw themselves on foreign assistances to spare their own, which, after all, are the only certain and sufficient ones.