It is hard to prevent oneself from believing what one so keenly desires, and who can doubt that the interest we have in admitting or denying the reality of the Judgement to come determines the faith of most men in accordance with their hopes and fears.
The continual emotion that is felt in the theater excites us, enervates us, enfeebles us, and makes us less able to resist our passions. And the sterile interest taken in virtue serves only to satisfy our vanity without obliging us to practice it.
It is by the activity of our passions, that our reason improves: we covet knowledge merely because we covet enjoyment, and it is impossible to conceive why a man exempt from fears and desires should take the trouble to reason.
The wisest writers devote themselves to what a man ought to know, without asking what a child is capable of learning. They are always looking for the man in the child, without considering what he is before he becomes a man.
Government in its infancy had no regular and permanent form. For want of a sufficient fund of philosophy and experience, men could see no further than the present inconveniences, and never thought of providing remedies for future ones, but in proportion as they arose.
My liveliest delight was in having conquered myself.
Quit thy childhood, my friend, and wake up!
The world is the book of women. Whatever knowledge they may possess is more commonly acquired by observation than by reading.
I am not made like any of those I have seen. I venture to believe that I am not made like any of those who are in existence. If I am not better, at least I am different.
As soon as any man says of the affairs of the State “What does it matter to me?” the State may be given up for lost.
The greatest braggarts are usually the biggest cowards.
Civilization is a hopeless race to discover remedies for the evils it produces.
I prefer liberty with danger to peace with slavery.
Consolation indiscreetly pressed upon us, when we are suffering undue affliction, only serves to increase our pain, and to render our grief more poignant.
It is unnatural for a majority to rule, for a majority can seldom be organized and united for specific action, and a minority can.
Watch a cat when it enters a room for the first time. It searches and smells about, it is not quiet for a moment, it trusts nothing until it has examined and made acquaintance with everything.
The passions are the voice of the body.
The person who has lived the most is not the one with the most years but the one with the richest experiences.
Every man has a right to risk his own life for the preservation of it.
What wisdom can you find that is greater than kindness?