Friends should be preferred to kings.

History is filled with the sound of silken slippers going downstairs and wooden shoes coming up.

Let us confess it: evil strides the world.

I never approved either the errors of his book, or the trivial truths he so vigorously laid down. I have, however, stoutly taken his side when absurd men have condemned him for these same truths.

All the known world, excepting only savage nations, is governed by books.

Originality is nothing but judicious imitation. The most original writers borrowed one from another.

History is nothing but a pack of tricks that we play upon the dead.