There is no observation more frequently made by such as employ themselves in surveying the conduct of mankind, than that marriage, though the dictate of nature, and the institution of Providence, is yet very often the cause of misery, and that those who enter into that state can seldom forbear to express their repentance, and their envy of those whom either chance or caution hath withheld from it.

Being reproached for giving to an unworthy person, Aristotle said, I did not give it to the man, but to humanity.

Most men think indistinctly, and therefore cannot speak with exactness . . .

The cure for the greatest part of human miseries is not radical, but palliative.

Ignorance, madam, pure ignorance.

If we estimate dignity by immediate usefulness, agriculture is undoubtedly the first and noblest science.

Many causes may vitiate a writer's judgement of his own works. On that which has cost him much labour he sets a high value, because he is unwilling to think that he has been diligent in vain: what has been produced without toilsome efforts is considered with delight as a proof of vigorous faculties and fertile invention; and the last work, whatever it be, has necessarily most of the grace of novelty.