“The friendships of the world are oft confederacies in vice, or leagues of pleasures.”
“'Tis not in mortals to command success, but we'll do more, Sempronius, we'll deserve it.”
“Cheerfulness is the best promoter of health and is as friendly to the mind as to the body.”
“One should take good care not to grow too wise for so great a pleasure of life as laughter.”
“To be exempt from the passions with which others are tormented, is the only pleasing solitude.”
“Friendship improves happiness, and abates misery, by doubling our joys, and dividing our grief.”
“Mutability of temper and inconsistency with ourselves is the greatest weakness of human nature.”
“The disease of jealously is so malignant that is converts all it takes into its own nourishment.”
“With regard to donations always expect the most from prudent people, who keep their own accounts.”
“To a man of pleasure every moment appears to be lost, which partakes not of the vivacity of amusement.”
“A man must be both stupid and uncharitable who believes there is no virtue or truth but on his own side.”
“Friendships, in general, are suddenly contracted; and therefore it is no wonder they are easily dissolved.”
“Prejudice and self-sufficiency naturally proceed from inexperience of the world, and ignorance of mankind.”
“''We are always doing,'' says he, ''something for posterity, but I would see posterity do something for us.''”
“That he delights in the misery of others no man will confess, and yet what other motive can make a father cruel?”
“Three grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love, and something to hope for.”
“No oppression is so heavy or lasting as that which is inflicted by the perversion and exorbitance of legal authority.”
“The fear of death often proves mortal, and sets people on methods to save their Lives, which infallibly destroy them.”
“A man's first care should be to avoid the reproaches of his own heart, and his next to escape the censures of the world.”
“The unjustifiable severity of a parent is loaded with this aggravation, that those whom he injures are always in his sight.”
“A cloudy day or a little sunshine have as great an influence on many constitutions as the most recent blessings or misfortunes.”
“Good nature is more agreeable in conversation than wit and gives a certain air to the countenance which is more amiable than beauty.”
“Of all the diversions of life, there is none so proper to fill up its empty spaces as the reading of useful and entertaining authors.”
“If we hope for what we are not likely to possess, we act and think in vain, and make life a greater dream and shadow than it really is.”
“The greatest sweetener of human life is Friendship. To raise this to the highest pitch of enjoyment, is a secret which but few discover.”
“An ostentatious man will rather relate a blunder or an absurdity he has committed, than be debarred from talking of his own dear person.”
“The important question is not, what will yield to man a few scattered pleasures, but what will render his life happy on the whole amount.”
“It is the privilege of posterity to set matters right between those antagonists who, by their rivalry for greatness, divided a whole age.”
“Men may change their climate, but they cannot change their nature. A man that goes out a fool cannot ride or sail himself into common sense.”
“Animals, in their generation, are wiser than the sons of men; but their wisdom is confined to a few particulars, and lies in a very narrow compass.”