If God did not exist, he would have to be invented.

Everyone places his good where he can and has as much of it as he can, in his own way.

The question of good and evil remains in irremediable chaos for those who seek to fathom it in reality. It is a mere mental sport to the disputants, who are captives that play with their chains.

The pleasure of governing must certainly be exquisite, if we may judge from the vast numbers who are eager to be concerned with it.

Great men have all been formed either before academies or independent of them.

Men hate the individual whom they call avaricious only because nothing can be gained from him.

Hope should no more be a virtue than fear; we fear and we hope, according to what is promised or threatened us.

Nature has always had more power than education.

Pleasantry is never good on serious points, because it always regards subjects in that point of view in which it is not the purpose to consider them.

Men use thought only as authority for their injustice, and employ speech only to conceal their thoughts.