"There is no man so good who were he to submit all his thoughts and actions to the laws would not deserve hanging ten times in his life."

"The advantage of living is not measured by length, but by use; some men have lived long, and lived little; attend to it while you are in it. It lies in your will, not in the number of years, for you to have lived enough."

"An unattempted lady could not vaunt of her chastity."

"Between ourselves, there are two things that I have always observed to be in singular accord: supercelestial thoughts and subterranean conduct."

"I study myself more than any other subject. That is my metaphysics, that is my physics."

"We should tend our freedom wisely."

"If you press me to say why I loved him, I can say no more than because he was he, and I was I."

"Confidence in others' honesty is no light testimony of one's own integrity."

"What a prodigious conscience must that be that can be at quiet within itself whilst it harbors under thesame roof, with so agreeing and so calm a society, both the crime and the judge?"

"For truly it is to be noted, that children's plays are not sports, and should be deemed as their most serious actions."

"No passion disturbs the soundness of our judgement as anger does."

"Any person of honor chooses rather to lose his honor than to lose his conscience."

"A good marriage would be between a blind wife and a deaf husband."

"When I am attacked by gloomy thoughts, nothing helps me so much as running to my books. They quickly absorb me and banish the clouds from my mind."

"When I religiously confess myself to myself I find that the best virtue I have has in it some tincture of vice."

"Pride and curiosity are the two scourges of our souls. The latter prompts us to poke our noses into everything, and the former forbids us to leave anything unresolved and undecided."

"Marriage is like a cage; one sees the birds outside desperate to get in, and those inside equally desperate to get out."

"Excellent memories are often coupled with feeble judgments."

"It is not reasonable that art should win the place of honor over our great and powerful mother Nature. We have so overloaded the beauty and richness of her works by our inventions that we have quite smothered her."

"I enjoy books as misers enjoy treasures, because I know I can enjoy them whenever I please."

"I find I am much prouder of the victory I obtain over myself, when, in the very ardor of dispute, I make myself submit to my adversary's force of reason, than I am pleased with the victory I obtain over him through his weakness."

"If ordinary people complain that I speak too much of myself, I complain that they do not even think of themselves."

"I quote others in order to better express my own self."

"Wit is a dangerous weapon, even to the possessor, if he knows not how to use it discreetly."

"If you don't know how to die, don't worry; Nature will tell you what to do on the spot, fully and adequately. She will do this job perfectly for you; don't bother your head about it."

"We have nothing to fear but fear itself."

"I write to keep from going mad from the contradictions I find among mankind - and to work some of those contradictions out for myself."

"Philosophy is doubt."

"The public weal requires that men should betray, and lie, and massacre."

"I put forward formless and unresolved notions, as do those who publish doubtful questions to debate in the schools, not to establish the truth but to seek it."

"'Tis the sharpness of our mind that gives the edge to our pains and pleasures."

"The most certain sign of wisdom is cheerfulness."

"No pleasure has any savor for me without communication."

"Fear desire hope still push us on toward the future."

"Tis no wonder, says one of the ancients, that chance has so great a dominion over us, since it is by chance we live."

"Oh what a valiant faculty is hope."

"We are all lumps, and of so various and inform a contexture, that every piece plays, every moment, its own game, and there is as much difference betwixt us and ourselves as betwixt us and others."

"Riches like glory or health have no more beauty or pleasure than their possessor is pleased to lend them."

"To an atheist all writings tend to atheism: he corrupts the most innocent matter with his own venom."

"Valor is stability not of legs and arms but of courage and the soul."

"The value of life lies not in the length of days, but in the use we make of them... Whether you find satisfaction in life depends not on your tale of years, but on your will."

"If it be well weighed, to say that a man lieth, is as much to say, as that he is brave towards God and a coward towards men."

"Let us give Nature a chance, she knows her business better than we do."

"Death, they say, acquits us of all obligations."

"Our zeal works wonders, whenever it supports our inclination toward hatred, cruelty, ambition."

"Stupidity and wisdom meet in the same centre of sentiment and resolution, in the suffering of human accidents."

"There is no greater enemy to those who would please than expectation."

"When I play with my cat, who knows whether she is not amusing herself with me more than I with her."

"Nothing fixes a thing so intensely in the memory as the wish to forget it."

"Let us not be ashamed to speak what we shame not to think."