Money does all things,--for it gives and it takes away; it makes honest men and knaves, fools and philosophers; and so forward, mutatis mutandis, to the end of the chapter.

Figure-flingers and star-gazers pretend to foretell the fortunes of kingdoms, and have no foresight in what concerns themselves.

Men talk as if they believed in God, but they live as if they thought there was none; their vows and promises are no more than words, of course.

Unruly ambition is deaf, not only to the advice of friends, but to the counsels and monitions of reason itself.

It is not the place, nor the condition, but the mind alone what it compares its situation to that can make anyone happy or miserable. Compare it to something better - result envy, frustration and sadness. Compare it to something worse - relief, gratitude and happiness.

Some read books only with a view to find fault, while others read only to be taught; the former are like venomous spiders, extracting a poisonous quality, where the latter, like the bees, sip out a sweet and profitable juice.

Ingratitude is abhorred by God and man.