If health and a fair day smile upon me, I am a very good fellow; if a corn trouble my toe, I am sullen, out of humor, and inaccessible.

And truly Philosophy is but sophisticated poetry. Whence do those ancient writers derive all their authority but from the poets?

It is easier to write an indifferent poem than to understand a good one.

No man is so exquisitely honest or upright in living, but that ten times in his life he might not lawfully be hanged.

An honest man is not accountable for the vice and folly of his trade, and therefore ought not to refuse the exercise of it. It is the custom of his country, and there is profit in it. We must live by the world, and such as we find it, so make use of it.

The good, supreme, divine poetry is above the rules and reason. Whoever discerns its beauty with a firm, sedate gaze does not see it, any more than he sees the splendor of a lightning flash. It does not persuade our judgement, it ravishes and overwhelms it.

Books are a languid pleasure.