Hope, deceitful as it is, carries us through life agreeably enough.
There are some disguised falsehoods so like truths, that ’twould be to judge ill not to be deceived by them.
We bear, all of us, the misfortunes of other people with heroic constancy.
Few know how to be old.
The simplest man with passion will be more persuasive than the most eloquent without.
When the heart is still disturbed by the relics of a passion it is proner to take up a new one than when wholly cured.
We sometimes condemn the present, by praising the past; and show our contempt of what is now, by our esteem for what is no more.
To praise great actions is in some sense to share them.
A man cannot please long who has only one kind of wit.
It is pointless for a woman to be young unless pretty, or to be pretty unless young.
There are women who never had an intrigue; but there are scarce any who never had but one.
Humility is often merely feigned submissiveness assumed in order to subject others, an artifice of pride which stoops to conquer, and although pride has a thousand ways of transforming itself it is never so well disguised and able to take people in as when masquerading as humility.
There are no accidents so unlucky but the prudent may draw some advantage from them.
Most women lament not the death of their lovers so much out of real affection for them, as because they would appear worthy of love.
Before we passionately desire a thing, we should examine the happiness of its possessor.
We should not be much concerned about faults we have the courage to own.
We love much better those who endeavor to imitate us, than those who strive to equal us. For imitation is a sign of esteem, but competition of envy.
Passion often renders the most clever man a fool, and sometimes renders the most foolish man clever.
There are certain defects which, well-mounted, glitter like virtue itself.
Our envy always outlives the felicity of its object.