I enjoy books as misers enjoy treasures, because I know I can enjoy them whenever I please.

It is not necessity but abundance which produces greed.

Travelling through the world produces a marvellous clarity in the judgment of men. We are all of us confined and enclosed within ourselves, and see no farther than the end of our nose.

Once conform, once do what others do because they do it, and a kind of lethargy steals over all the finer senses of the soul.

There is no doubt that Greek and Latin are great and handsome ornaments, but we buy them too dear.

What harm cause not those huge draughts or pictures which wanton youth with chalk or coals draw in each passage, wall or stairs of our great houses, whence a cruel contempt of our natural store is bred in them?

I am afraid that our eyes are bigger than our stomachs, and that we have more curiosity than understanding. We grasp at everything, but catch nothing except wind.