Virtues, like essences, lose their fragrance when exposed.

Critics must excuse me if I compare them to certain animals called asses, who, by gnawing vines, originally taught the great advantage of pruning them.

A person that would secure to himself great deference will, perhaps, gain his point by silence as effectually as by anything he can say.

Reserve is no more essentially connected with understanding than a church organ with devotion, or wine with good-nature.

Those who are incapable of shining out by dress would do well to consider that the contrast between them and their clothes turns out much to their disadvantage.

Prudent men lock up their motives, letting familiars have a key to their hearts, as to their garden.

Bashfulness is more frequently connected with good sense than we find assurance; and impudence, on the other hand, is often the mere effect of downright stupidity.