Laws gain their authority from actual possession and custom: it is perilous to go back to their origins; laws, like our rivers, get greater and nobler as they roll along: follow them back upstream to their sources and all you find is a tiny spring, hardly recognizable; as time goes by it swells with pride and grows in strength.

The finest lives in my opinion are the common model, without miracle and without extravagance.

We owe subjection and obedience to all our kings, whether good or bad, alike, for that has respect unto their office; but as to esteem and affection, these are only due to their virtue.

The memory represents to us not what we choose but what it pleases.

The honor we receive from those that fear us, is not honor; those respects are paid to royalty and not to me.

All general judgments are loose and imperfect

Virtue rejects facility to be her companion. She requires a craggy, rough and thorny way.