Never do a thing concerning the rectitude of which you are in doubt.

He [Pliny the Elder] used to say that 'no book [etc] was so bad but some good might be got out of it'.

Objects which are usually the motives of our travels by land and by sea are often overlooked and neglected if they lie under our eye.

That indolent but agreeable condition of doing nothing.

However often you may have done them a favour, if you once refuse they forget everything except your refusal.

Glory ought to be the consequence, not the motive of our actions.

The highest of characters is his who is as ready to pardon the moral errors of mankind as if he were every day guilty of them himself; and as cautious of committing a fault as if he never forgave one.