Nothing can be more absurd than the practice that prevails in our country of men and women not following the same pursuits with all their strengths and with one mind, for thus, the state instead of being whole is reduced to half.

What I say is that 'just' or 'right' means nothing but what is in the interest of the stronger party.

We ought to fly away from earth to heaven as quickly as we can; and to fly away is to become like God, as far as this is possible; and to become like him is to become holy, just, and wise.

I fear this is not the right exchange to attain virtue, to exchange pleasures for pleasures, pains for pains and fears for fears, the greater for the less like coins, but that the only valid currency for which all these things should be exchanged is wisdom.

From a short-sided view, the whole moving contents of the heavens seemed to them a parcel of stones, earth and other soul-less bodies, though they furnish the sources of the world order.

Justice is nothing more than the advantage of the stronger.

For as there are misanthropists, or haters of men, there are also misologists, or haters of ideas, and both spring from the same cause, which is ignorance of the world.