I seek in the reading of books, only to please myself, by an honest diversion.

We find ourselves more taken with the running up and down, the games, and puerile simplicities of our children, than we do, afterward, with their most complete actions; as if we had loved them for our sport, like monkeys, and not as men.

Don't discuss yourself, for you are bound to lose; if you belittle yourself, you are believed; if you praise yourself, you are disbelieved.

One may be humble out of pride.

Old age is a lease nature only signs as a particular favor, and it may be, to one, only in the space of two or three ages; and then with a pass to boot, to carry him through, all the traverses and difficulties she has strewed in the way of his long career.

No wind serves him who addresses his voyage to no certain port.

It is not necessity but abundance which produces greed.