The soul languishing in obscurity contracts a kind of rust, or abandons itself to the chimera of presumption; for it is natural for it to acquire something, even when separated from any one.

Prune what is turgid, elevate what is commonplace, arrange what is disorderly, introduce rhythm where the language is harsh, modify where it is too absolute.

To my mind the boy who gives least promise is one in whom the critical faculty develops in advance of the imagination.

For comic writers charge Socrates with making the worse appear the better reason.

A liar must have a good memory. -Mendacem oportet esse memorem

Give bread to a stranger, in the name of the universal brotherhood which binds together all men under the common father of nature.

Though ambition may be a fault in itself, it is often the mother of virtues.