That all who are happy are equally happy is not true. A peasant and a philosopher may be equally satisfied, but not equally happy. A small drinking glass and a large one may be equally full, but the large one holds more than the small.

While an author is yet living, we estimate his powers by his worst performance; and when he is dead, we rate him by his best.

In civilized society we all depend upon each other, and our happiness is very much owing to the good opinion of mankind.

A country is in a bad state, which is governed only by laws; because a thousand things occur for which laws cannot provide, and where authority ought to interpose.

Resolve not to be poor: whatever you have, spend less. Poverty is a great enemy to human happiness; it certainly destroys liberty, and it makes some virtues impracticable, and others extremely difficult.

Men who have flattered themselves into this opinion of their own abilities, look down on all who waste their lives over books, as a race of inferior beings condemned by nature to perpetual pupilage, and fruitlessly endeavouring to remedy their barrenness by incessant cultivation, or succour their feebleness by subsidiary strength. They presume that none would be more industrious than they, if they were not more sensible of deficiences; and readily conclude, that he who places no confidence in his own powers owes his modesty only to his weakness.

Many things difficult to design prove easy to performance.