The way to wickedness is always through wickedness.

It is easier to exclude harmful passions than to rule them, and to deny them admittance than to control them after they have been admitted.

Let us fight the battle-retreat from the things that attract us and rouse ourselves to meet the things that actually attack us.

No man ever became wise by chance.

If thou wishest to get rid of thy evil propensities, thou must keep far from evil companions.

There is nothing in the world so much admired as a man who knows how to bear unhappiness with courage.

Upon occasion we should go as far as intoxication.... Drink washes cares away, stirs the mind from its lowest depths.... But in liberty moderation is wholesome, and so it is in wine.... We ought not indulge too often, for fear the mind contract a bad habit, yet it is right to draw it toward elation and release and to banish dull sobriety for a little.