Knavery is the best defense against a knave.

The ripeness of adolescence is prodigal in pleasures, skittish, and in need of a bridle.

Good fortune will elevate even petty minds, and give them the appearance of a certain greatness and stateliness, as from their high place they look down upon the world; but the truly noble and resolved spirit raises itself, and becomes more conspicuous in times of disaster and ill fortune.

Lying is a most disgraceful vice; it first despises God, and then fears men.

Nature without learning is like a blind man; learning without Nature, like a maimed one; practice without both, incomplete. As in agriculture a good soil is first sought for, then a skilful husbandman, and then good seed; in the same way nature corresponds to the soil, the teacher to the husbandman, precepts and instruction to the seed.

Fate leads him who follows it, and drags him who resist.

Painting is silent poetry, and poetry is painting that speaks.