Human wisdom makes as ill use of her talent when she exercises it in rescinding from the number and sweetness of those pleasures that are naturally our due, as she employs it favorably and well in artificially disguising and tricking out the ills of life to alleviate the sense of them.

And therefore, Reader, I myself am the subject of my book: it is not reasonable that you should employ your leisure on a topic so frivolous and so vain. Therefore, Farewell.

Obstinacy and contention are common qualities, most appearing in, and best becoming, a mean and illiterate soul.

How often, being moved under a false cause, if the person offending makes a good defense and presents us with a just excuse, are we angry against truth and innocence itself?

Nothing fixes a thing so intensely in the memory as the wish to forget it.

There is no conversation more boring than the one where everybody agrees.

Whether the events in our life are good or bad, greatly depends on the way we perceive them.