Most men are rich in borrowed sufficiency: a man may very well say a good thing, give a good answer, cite a good sentence, without at all seeing the force of either the one or the other.

Arts and sciences are not cast in a mould, but are found and perfected by degrees, by often handling and polishing.

A young man ought to cross his own rules, to awake his vigor, and to keep it from growing faint and rusty. And there is no course of life so weak and sottish as that which is carried on by rule and discipline.

I, who am king of the matter I treat, and who owe an accounting for it to no one, do not for all that believe myself in all I write. I often hazard sallies of my mind which I mistrust.

It is equally pointless to weep because we won't be alive a hundred years from now as that we were not here a hundred years ago.

The truth of these days is not that which really is, but what every man persuades another man to believe.

He loves little who loves by rule.