Discernment is a power of the understanding in which few excel. Is not that owing to its connection with impartiality and truth? for are not prejudic….

There is in some men a dispassionate neutrality of mind, which, though it generally passes for good temper, can neither gratify nor warm us: it must ….

The mind of man is this world's true dimension; and knowledge is the measure of the mind..

The world is an excellent judge in general, but a very bad one in particular..

Good-humor is allied to generosity, ill-humor to meanness..

What an argument in favor of social connections is the observation that by communicating our grief we have less, and by communicating our pleasure we….

Envy is but the smoke of low estate, Ascending still against the fortunate..

We laugh heartily to see a whole flock of sheep jump because one did so. Might not one imagine that superior beings do the same, and for exactly the ….

It is not enough that you can form nay, and follow, the most excellent rules for conducting yourself in the world. You must also know when to deviate….

Human knowledge is the parent of doubt..

I hardly know so true a mark of a little mind as the servile imitation of others..

Weak men often from the very principle of their weakness derive a certain susceptibility; delicacy and taste which render them, in those particulars,….

True joy is only hope put out of fear..

A lively and agreeable man has not only the merit of liveliness and agreeableness himself, but that also of awakening them in others..

Good-humor will sometimes conquer ill-humor, but ill-humor will conquer it oftener; and for this plain reason, good-humor must operate on generosity,….

Despair gives the shocking ease to the mind that a mortification gives to the body..

A very small offence may be a just cause for great resentment: it is often much less the particular instance which is obnoxious to us than the proof ….

Out of mind as soon as out of sight..

I hardly know a sight that raises one's indignation more than that of an enlarged soul joined to a contracted fortune; unless it be that so much more….

Whatever natural right men may have to freedom and independency, it is manifest that some men have a natural ascendency over others..

There is an unfortunate disposition in a man to attend much more to the faults of his companions which offend him, than to their perfections which pl….