What a wonderful thing it is that drop of seed, from which we are produced, bears in itself the impressions, not only of the bodily shape, but of the thoughts and inclinations of our fathers!

The receipts of cookery are swelled to a volume, but a good stomach excels them all; to which nothing contributes more than industry and temperance.

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

All permanent decisions are made in a temporary state of mind.

Repentance is but a denying of our will, and an opposition of our fantasies.

Whatever is enforced by command is more imputed to him who exacts than to him who performs.

The most unhappy and frail creatures are men and yet they are the proudest.