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

Men indulge those opinions and practices that favor their pretensions.

So long as we stand in need of a benefit, there is nothing dearer to us; nor anything cheaper when we have received it.

Tis not necessity, but opinion, that makes men miserable; and when we come to be fancy-sick, there's no cure.

Some natures are so sour and ungrateful that they are never to be obliged.

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

The devil helps his servants for a season; but when they get into a pinch; he leaves them in the lurch.