Good temper is one of the great preservers of the features.

There is some virtue in almost every vice, except hypocrisy; and even that, while it is a mockery of virtue, is at the same time a compliment to it.

There is nothing so remote from vanity as true genius. It is almost as natural for those who are endowed with the highest powers of the human mind to produce the miracles of art, as for other men to breathe or move. Correggio, who is said to have produced some of his divinest works almost without having seen a picture, probably did not know that he had done anything extraordinary.

Cunning is the art of concealing our own defects, and discovering other people's weaknesses.

Hope is the best possession.

We trifle with, make sport of, and despise those who are attached to us, and follow those that fly from us.

The diffusion of taste is not the same thing as the improvement of taste.