"There are very few things impossible in themselves; and we do not want means to conquer difficulties so much as application and resolution in the use of means."

"Men give away nothing so liberally as their advice."

"The reason that lovers never weary each other is because they are always talking about themselves."

"It's the height of folly to want to be the only wise one."

"We confess our little faults to persuade people that we have no large ones."

"There are various sorts of curiosity; one is from interest, which makes us desire to know that which may be useful to us; and the other, from pride which comes from the wish to know what others are ignorant of."

"The reason why so few people are agreeable in conversation is that each is thinking more about what he intends to say than others are saying."

"A great many men's gratitude is nothing but a secret desire to hook in more valuable kindnesses hereafter."

"We pardon to the extent that we love."

"There is nothing men are so generous of as advice."

"Pride does not wish to owe and vanity does not wish to pay."

"There are but very few men clever enough to know all the mischief they do."

"There are few virtuous women who are not bored with their trade."

"Our concern for the loss of our friends is not always from a sense of their worth, but rather of our own need of them and that we have lost some who had a good opinion of us."

"The moderation of people in prosperity is the effect of a smooth and composed temper, owing to the calm of their good fortune."

"The more one loves a mistress, the more one is ready to hate her."

"We are more interested in making others believe we are happy than in trying to be happy ourselves."

"Love often leads on to ambition, but seldom does one return from ambition to love."

"Being a blockhead is sometimes the best security against being cheated by a man of wit."

"People always complain about their memories, never about their minds."

"Perhaps being old is having lighted rooms inside your head, and people in them, acting. People you know, yet can't quite name."

"There is a kind of elevation which does not depend on fortune; it is a certain air which distinguishes us, and seems to destine us for great things; it is a price which we imperceptibly set upon ourselves."

"Only the contemptible fear contempt."

"It is easier to know men in general, than men in particular."

"We all have enough strength to endure the misfortunes of others."

"It is with an old love as it is with old age a man lives to all the miseries, but is dead to all the pleasures."

"We seldom praise anyone in good earnest, except such as admire us."

"Some counterfeits reproduce so very well the truth that it would be a flaw of judgment not to be deceived by them."

"A man's worth has its season, like fruit."

"I have always been an admirer. I regard the gift of admiration as indispensable if one is to amount to something; I don't know where I would be without it."

"In all professions each affects a look and an exterior to appear what he wishes the world to believe that he is. Thus we may say that the whole world is made up of appearances."

"As it is the characteristic of great wits to say much in few words, so small wits seem to have the gift of speaking much and saying nothing."

"When our vices leave us, we like to imagine it is we who are leaving them."

"There is only one kind of love, but there are a thousand imitations."

"A work can become modern only if it is first postmodern. Postmodernism thus understood is not modernism at its end but in the nascent state, and this state is constant."

"Never give anyone the advice to buy or sell shares, because the most benevolent price of advice can turn out badly."

"Philosophy finds it an easy matter to vanquish past and future evils, but the present are commonly too hard for it."

"The name and pretense of virtue is as serviceable to self-interest as are real vices."

"The defects and faults of the mind are like wounds in the body; after all imaginable care has been taken to heal them up, still there will be a scar left behind, and they are in continual danger of breaking the skin and bursting out again."

"We say little, when vanity does not make us speak."

"The force we use on ourselves, to prevent ourselves from loving, is often more cruel than the severest treatment at the hands of one loved."

"True love is like ghosts, which everyone talks about and few have seen."

"Some people displease with merit, and others' very faults and defects are pleasing."

"We get so much in the habit of wearing disguises before others that we finally appear disguised before ourselves."

"Though men are apt to flatter and exalt themselves with their great achievements, yet these are, in truth, very often owing not so much to design as chance."

"Why can we remember the tiniest detail that has happened to us, and not remember how many times we have told it to the same person."

"Though nature be ever so generous, yet can she not make a hero alone. Fortune must contribute her part too; and till both concur, the work cannot be perfected."

"Why is it that our memory is good enough to retain the least triviality that happens to us, and yet not good enough to recollect how often we have told it to the same person?"

"He who lives without folly isn't so wise as he thinks."

"A wise man thinks it more advantageous not to join the battle than to win."