The chief glory of every people arises from its authors.

Many need no other provocation to enmity than that they find themselves excelled.

Every man thinks meanly of himself for not having been a soldier, or not having been at sea.

To love their country has been considered as virtue in men, whose love could not be otherwise than blind, because their preference was made without, a comparison; but it has never been my fortune to find, either in ancient or modern writers, any honourable mention of those, who have, with equal blindness, hated their country.

Advice is seldom welcome. Those who need it most, like it least.

There is nothing so minute, or inconsiderable, that I would not rather know it than not.

The return of my birthday, if I remember it, fills me with thoughts which it seems to be the general care of humanity to escape.