Honesty is the best policy; but he who is governed by that maxim is not an honest man.

In our judgment of human transactions, the law of optics is reversed, we see most dimly the objects which are close around us.

All gaming, since it implies a desire to profit at the expense of another, involves a breach of the tenth commandment.

When men have become heartily wearied of licentious anarchy, their eagerness has been proportionately great to embrace the opposite extreme of rigorous despotism.

Fancy, when once brought into religion, knows not where to stop. It is like one of those fiends in old stories which any one could raise, but which, when raised, could never be kept within the magic circle.

knowledge of our duties is the most useful part of philosophy.

Men first make up their minds (and the smaller the mind the sooner made up), and then seek for the reasons; and if they chance to stumble upon a good reason, of course they do not reject it. But though they are right, they are only right by chance.