Virtue runs no risk of becoming contemptible by being exposed to view, and it is better to be despised for simplicity than to be tormented by continual hypocrisy.

I shall never be ashamed of citing a bad author if the line is good.

That man lives badly who does not know how to die well.

It is generally agreed that no activity can be successfully pursued by an individual who is preoccupied - not rhetoric or liberal studies - since the mind when distracted absorbs nothing deeply, but rejects everything which is, so to speak, crammed into it.

It is not that we have a short space of time, but that we waste much of it. Life is long enough.

All savageness is a sign of weakness.

I do not trust my eyes to tell me what a man is: I have a better and more trustworthy light by which I can distinguish what is true from what is false: let the mind find out what is good for the mind.

He who has injured thee was either stronger or weaker than thee. If weaker, spare him; if stronger, spare thyself.

If any one is angry with you, meet his anger by returning benefits for it: a quarrel which is only taken up on one side falls to the ground: it takes two men to fight.

This is the worst trait of minds rendered arrogant by prosperity, they hate those whom they have injured.