We reform others unconsciously when we walk uprightly.

Since there must be chimeras, why is not perfection the chimera of all men?

The best of lessons, for a good many people, would be to listen at a keyhole. It is a pity for such that the practice is dishonorable.

There are minds constructed like the eyes of certain insects, which discern, with admirable distinctness, the most delicate lineaments and finest veins of the leaf which bears them, but are totally unable to take in the ensemble of the plant or shrub. When error has effected an entrance into such minds, it remains there impregnable, because no general view assists them in throwing off the chance impression of the moment.

In retirement, the passage of time seems accelerated. Nothing warns us of its flight. It is a wave which never murmurs, because there is no obstacle to its flow.

The most culpable of the excesses of Liberty is the harm she does herself.

If it were ever allowable to forget what is due to superiority of rank, it would be when the privileged themselves remember it.