Things seem greater by imagination than they are in effect.

A little of everything and nothing thoroughly, after the French fashion.

I had rather complain of ill-fortune than be ashamed of victory.

Others form man; I tell of him, and portray a particular one, very ill-formed, whom I should really make very different from whathe is if I had to fashion him over again. But now it is done.

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

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.

I want death to find me planting my cabbages, but careless of death, and still more of my unfinished garden.