Genius always looks forward, and not only sees what is, but what necessarily will be..

One great reason why men practice generosity so little in the world, is, their finding so little there: generosity is catching; and if so many men es….

There is scarce any passion so heartily decried by moralists and satirists, as AMBITION; and yet, methinks, ambition is not a vice but in a vicious m….

Habit is the cement of society, the comfort of life, and, alas! The root of error..

Pleasure is the business of the young, business the pleasure of the old..

Taste may be compared to that exquisite sense of the bee, which instantly discovers and extracts the quintessence of every flower, and disregards all….

How seldom is generosity perfect and pure! How often do men give because it throws a certain inferiority on those who receive, and superiority on the….

We are not slow at discovering the selfishness of others; for this plain reason--because it clashes with our own..

No man was ever so much deceived by another as by himself..

Man is said to be a rational creature; but should it not rather be said, that man is a creature capable of being rational, as we say a parrot is a cr….

Man is the only creature endowed with the power of laughter; is he not also the only one that deserves to be laughed at?.

Though love and hatred are as opposites as fire and water, yet do they sometimes subsist in the breast together towards the same person; nay by their….

The criterion of true beauty is that it increases on examination; if false, that it lessens..

Politics is the food of sense exposed to the hunger of folly..

We are oftener deceived by being told some truth than no truth..

How happy is it for us, that the admiration of others should depend so much more on their ignorance than our perfection!.

Wit catches of wit, as fire of fire..

Love will sacrifice more to others than friendship, but then it exacts more from them..

The mind's eye is perhaps no better fitted for the full radiance of truth, than is the body's for that of the sun..

Men often prove the violence of their own prejudices, even by the violence with which they attack the prejudices of other people..

Two men are equally free from the rage of ambition; are they therefore equal in merit? Perhaps not; one may be above ambition, the other below it..