Politeness is fictitious benevolence.

A minute analysis of life at once destroys that splendor which dazzles the imagination. Whatsoever grandeur can display, or luxury enjoy, is procured by offices of which the mind shrinks from the contemplation. All the delicacies of the table may be traced back to the shambles and the dunghill; all magnificence of building was hewn from the quarry, and all the pomp of ornament dug from among the damps and darkness of the mine.

Nobody can write the life of a man but those who have eat and drunk and lived in social intercourse with him.

A successful author is equally in danger of the diminution of his fame, whether he continues or ceases to write.

It is astonishing that any man can forbear enquiring seriously whether there is a God; whether God is just; whether this life is the only state of existence.

Preserve me from unseasonable and immoderate sleep.

Large offers and sturdy rejections are among the most common topics of falsehood.