If what happens does not make us richer, we must welcome it if it makes us wiser.
The wise man applauds he who he thinks most virtuous; the rest of the world applauds the wealthy.
Knowledge is more than equivalent to force. The master of mechanics laughs at strength.
It is wonderful to think how men of very large estates not only spend their yearly income, but are often actually in want of money. It is clear, they have not value for what they spend.
Sir, he throws away his money without thought and without merit. I do not call a tree generous that sheds its fruit at every breeze.
One of the aged greatest miseries is that they cannot easily find a companion able to share the memories of the past.
That fellow seems to me to possess but one idea, and that is a wrong one.
He that accepts protection, stipulates obedience. We have always protected the Americans; we may therefore subject them to government.
No government power can be abused long. Mankind will not bear it.
Vulgar and inactive minds confound familiarity with knowledge, and conceive themselves informed of the whole nature of things, when they are shown their form or told their use.
To excite opposition and inflame malevolence is the unhappy privilege of courage made arrogant by consciousness of strength.
The appearance and retirement of actors are the great events of the theatrical world; and their first performances fill the pit with conjecture and prognostication, as the first actions of a new monarch agitate nations with hope and fear.
Many falsehoods are passing into uncontradicted history.
Wise married women don’t trouble themselves about infidelity in their husbands.
Sir, they are a race of convicts and ought to be grateful for anything we allow them short of hanging.
Life will not bear refinement. You must do as other people do.
Here lies our good Edmund, whose genius was such, We scarcely can praise it or blame it too much; Who, born for the Universe, narrowed his mind, And to party gave up what was meant for mankind.
Tea’s proper use is to amuse the idle, and relax the studious, and dilute the full meals of those who cannot use exercise, and will not use abstinence.
If I had no duties, and no reference to futurity, I would spend my life in driving briskly in a post-chaise with a pretty woman.
Among the lower classes of mankind there will be found very little desire of any other knowledge than what may contribute immediately to the relief of some pressing uneasiness, or the attainment of some near advantage.