The execution of any thing considerable implies in the first place previous persevering meditation.

If admiration were not generally deemed the exclusive property of the rich, and contempt the constant lackey of poverty, the love of gain would cease to be an universal problem.

The real or supposed rights of man are of two kinds, active and passive; the right in certain cases to do as we list; and the right we possess to the forbearance or assistance of other men. The first of these a just philosophy will probably induce us universally to explode.

As long as parents and teachers in general shall fall under the established rule, it is clear that politics and modes of government will educate and infect us all. They poison our minds, before we can resist, or so much as suspect their malignity. Like the barbarous directors of the Eastern seraglios, they deprive us of our vitality, and fit us for their despicable employment from the cradle.

Power is not happiness. Security and peace are more to be desired than a name at which nations tremble.

Literature, taken in all its bearings, forms the grand line of demarcation between the human and the animal kingdoms.

The subtleties of mathematics defecate the grossness of our apprehension, and supply the elements of a sounder and severer logic.