Money does all things for reward. Some are pious and honest as long as they thrive upon it, but if the devil himself gives better wages, they soon change their party.
Take away ambition and vanity, and where will be your heroes and patriots?
Dignity increases more easily than it begins.
Where silence is not allowed, what then is permissible?
Elegance is not an ornament worthy of man.
The deep waters of time will flow over us: only a few men of genius will lift a head above the surface, and though doomed eventually to pass into the same silence, will fight against oblivion and for a long time hold their own.