A man may be so much of everything that he is nothing of anything.

Every reader should remember the diffidence of Socrates, and repair by his candour the injuries of time: he should impute the seeming defects of his author to some chasm of intelligence, and suppose that the sense which is now weak was once forcible

Admiration and love are like being intoxicated with champagne; judgment and friendship are like being enlivened.

To fix the thoughts by writing, and subject them to frequent examinations and reviews, is the best method of enabling the mind to detect its own sophisms, and keep it on guard against the fallacies which it practices on others

I inherited a vile melancholy from my father, which has made me mad all my life, at least not sober.

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

The future is bought with the present.