Competition of praise inclineth to a reverence of antiquity. For men contend with the living, not with the dead.

If I read as many books as most men do, I would be as dull-witted as they are.

The praise of ancient authors proceeds not from the reverence of the dead, but from the competition and mutual envy of the living.

A great leap in the dark

It is not easy to fall into any absurdity, unless it be by the length of an account; wherein he may perhaps forget what went before. For all men by nature reason alike, and well, when they have good principles.

Government is necessary, not because man is naturally bad... but because man is by nature more individualistic than social.

Corporations are may lesser commonwealths in the bowels of a greater, like worms in the entrails of a natural man.