Whatever fortune has raised to a height, she has raised only to cast it down.

There is nothing the busy man is less busied with than living; there is nothing harder to learn.

Shall I tell you what the real evil is? To cringe to the things that are called evils, to surrender to them our freedom, in defiance of which we ought to face any suffering.

We are taught for the schoolroom, not for life.

We are at best but stewards of what we falsely call our own; yet avarice is so insatiable that it is not in the power of liberality to content it.

Our fears are always more numerous than our dangers.

To be always fortunate, and to pass through life with a soul that has never known sorrow, is to be ignorant of one half of nature.