The curiosity of knowing things has been given to man for a scourge.

We may so seize on virtue, that if we embrace it with an overgreedy and violent desire, it may become vicious.

It is a rare life that remains orderly even in private.

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

Philosophical discussions habitually make men happy and joyful not frowning and sad.

But the touch or company of any man whatsoever stirreth up their heat, which in their solitude was hushed and quiet, and lay as cinders raked up in ashes.

The bees pillage the flowers here and there but they make honey of them which is all their own; it is no longer thyme or marjolaine: so the pieces borrowed from others he will transform and mix up into a work all his own.