We are so presumptuous that we think we can separate our personal interest from that of humanity, and slander mankind without compromising ourselves.
The best things are the most common.
If our friends do us a service, we think they owe it to us by their title of friend. We never think that they do not owe us their friendship.
If passion sometimes counsels greater boldness than does reflection, it gives more strength to execute it.
The light of the dawn is not so sweet as the first glimpses of fame.
A man can hardly be said to have made a fortune if he does not know how to enjoy it.
The wicked are always surprised to find that the good can be clever.
Men despise great projects when they do not feel themselves capable of great successes.
Fools do not understand men of intelligence.
In order to protect himself from force, man was obliged to submit to justice. Justice or force: he was compelled to choose between the two masters, so little are we made to be independent.
I do not approve the maxim which desires a man to know a little of everything. Superficial knowledge, knowledge without principles, is almost always useless and sometimes harmful knowledge.
A liar is a man who does now know how to deceive, a flatterer one who only deceives fools: he who knows how to make skilful use of the truth, and understands its eloquence, can alone pride himself in cleverness.
Mediocre men sometimes fear great office, and when they do not aim at it, or when they refuse it, all that is to be concluded is that they are aware of their mediocrity.
Great men, like nature, use simple language.
The greatest evil that fortune can bring to men is to endow them with feeble resources and yet to make them ambitious.
Necessity embitters the evils which it cannot cure.
There are many things we despise in order that we may not have to despise ourselves.
The lazy are always wanting to do something.
What we call a brilliant thought is usually just a captivating expression which, with the help of a little truth, imposes a surprising error on us.
Virtue is so praiseworthy that wicked people practise it from self-interest.
However we may be reproached for our vanity we sometimes need to be assured of our merits and to have our most obvious advantages pointed out to us.