The use of travelling is to regulate imagination by reality, and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are.

It requires but little acquaintance with the heart to know that woman's first wish is to be handsome; and that, consequently, the readiest method of obtaining her kindness is to praise her beauty.

Many of our miseries are merely comparative: we are often made unhappy, not by the presence of any real evil, but by the absence of some fictitious good; of something which is not required by any real want of nature, which has not in itself any power of gratification, and which neither reason nor fancy would have prompted us to wish, did we not see it in the possession of others.

The mind is seldom quickened to very vigorous operations but by pain, or the dread of pain. We do not disturb ourselves with the detection of fallacies which do us no harm.

Were it not for imagination a man would be as happy in the arms of a chambermaid as of a duchess.

It is a maxim that no man was ever enslaved by influence while he was fit to be free.

Nothing can be truly great which is not right.