Life and death appear more certainly ours than whatsoever else; and yet hardly can that be called ours, which comes without our knowledge, and goes without it.

Those who are quite satisfied sit still and do nothing; those who are not quite satisfied are the sole benefactors of the world.

Do not expect to be acknowledged for what you are, much less for what you would be; since no one can well measure a great man but upon the bier.

Merit has rarely risen of itself, but a pebble or a twig is often quite sufficient for it to spring from to the highest ascent. There is usually some baseness before there is any elevation.

We are poor, indeed, when we have no half-wishes left us. The heart and the imagination close the shutters the instant they are gone.

Cruelty is the highest pleasure to the cruel man; it is his love.

It has been my fortune to love in general those men most who have thought most differently from me, on subjects wherein others pardon no discordance. I think I have no more right to be angry with a man, whose reason has followed up a process different from what mine has, and is satisfied with the result, than with one who has gone to Venice while I am at Siena, and who writes to me that he likes the place.