There is power in ambition, pleasure in luxury...but envy can gain nothing but vexation.

For there is no air that men so greedily draw in, that diffuses itself so soon, and that penetrates so deep as that of license.

Lend yourself to others, but give yourself to yourself.

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

We have no participation in Being, because all human nature is ever midway between being born and dying, giving off only a vague image and shadow of itself, and a weak and uncertain opinion. And if you chance to fix your thoughts on trying to grasp its essence, it would be neither more nor less than if your tried to clutch water.

All the world knows me in my book, and my book in me.

As for me, then, I love life and cultivate it just as God has been pleased to grant it to us.