All human excellence is but comparative — there are persons who excel us, as much as we fancy we excel the meanest.

As a child is indulged or checked in its early follies, a ground is generally laid for the happiness or misery of the future man.

Those who respect age, deserve to live to be old, and to be respected themselves.

Who would not rather be the sufferer than the defrauder?

Men know no medium: They will either, spaniel-like, fawn at your feet, or be ready to leap into your lap.

Marry first, and love will come after is a shocking assertion; since a thousand things may happen to make the state but barely tolerable, when it is entered into with mutual affection.

A man who flatters a woman hopes either to find her a fool or to make her one.