All Quotes

"Man is certainly stark mad; he cannot make a worm, and yet he will be making gods by dozens."

"Why may not a goose say thus: "All the parts of the universe I have an interest in: the earth serves me to walk upon, the sun to light me; the stars have their influence upon me; I have such an advantage by the winds and such by the waters; there is nothing that yon heavenly roof looks upon so favourably as me. I am the darling of Nature! Is it not man that keeps and serves me?""

"Arts and sciences are not cast in a mould, but are formed and perfected by degrees, by often handling and polishing, as bears leisurely lick their cubs into form."

"He that I am reading seems always to have the most force."

"Apollo said that every one's true worship was that which he found in use in the place where he chanced to be."

"How many worthy men have we seen survive their own reputation!"

"The mariner of old said to Neptune in a great tempest, "O God! thou mayest save me if thou wilt, and if thou wilt thou mayest destroy me; but whether or no, I will steer my rudder true.""

"One may be humble out of pride."

"I find that the best virtue I have has in it some tincture of vice."

"Saying is one thing, doing another."

"Is it not a noble farce, wherein kings, republics, and emperors have for so many ages played their parts, and to which the whole vast universe serves for a theatre?"

"Nature forms us for ourselves, not for others; to be, not to seem."

"There never was in the world two opinions alike, no more than two hairs or two grains; the most universal quality is diversity."

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

"It happens as with cages: the birds without despair to get in, and those within despair of getting out."

"And to bring in a new word by the head and shoulders, they leave out the old one."

"All the world knows me in my book, and my book in me."

"'T is so much to be a king, that he only is so by being so. The strange lustre that surrounds him conceals and shrouds him from us; our sight is there broken and dissipated, being stopped and filled by the prevailing light."

"We are born to inquire after truth; it belongs to a greater power to possess it. It is not, as Democritus said, hid in the bottom of the deeps, but rather elevated to an infinite height in the divine knowledge."

"I moreover affirm that our wisdom itself, and wisest consultations, for the most part commit themselves to the conduct of chance."

"What if he has borrowed the matter and spoiled the form, as it oft falls out?"

"The oldest and best known evil was ever more supportable than one that was new and untried."

"Not because Socrates said so,… I look upon all men as my compatriots."

"My appetite comes to me while eating."

"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."

"Saturninus said, "Comrades, you have lost a good captain to make him an ill general.""

"A little folly is desirable in him that will not be guilty of stupidity."

"Habit is a second nature."

"We seek and offer ourselves to be gulled."

"I have never seen a greater monster or miracle in the world than myself."

"Men are most apt to believe what they least understand."

"I have here only made a nosegay of culled flowers, and have brought nothing of my own but the thread that ties them together."

"Amongst so many borrowed things, I am glad if I can steal one, disguising and altering it for some new service."

"I am further of opinion that it would be better for us to have [no laws] at all than to have them in so prodigious numbers as we have."

"For truth itself has not the privilege to be spoken at all times and in all sorts."

"The diversity of physical arguments and opinions embraces all sorts of methods."

"I have ever loved to repose myself, whether sitting or lying, with my heels as high or higher than my head."

"I, who have so much and so universally adored this [greek], "excellent mediocrity," 32 of ancient times, and who have concluded the most moderate measure the most perfect, shall I pretend to an unreasonable and prodigious old age?"

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

"A wise man sees as much as he ought, not as much as he can"

"Age imprints more wrinkles in the mind than it does on the face."

"Ambition is not a vice of little people."

"An untempted woman cannot boast of her chastity."

"Confidence in another man's virtue is no light evidence of a man's own, and God willingly favors such a confidence."

"Courtesy is a science of the highest importance. It is, like grace and beauty in the body, which charm at first sight, and lead on to further intimacy and friendship, opening a door that we may derive instruction from the example of others, and at the same time enabling us to benefit them by our example, if there be anything in our character worthy of imitation."

"Covetousness is both the beginning and the end of the devil's alphabet— the first vice in corrupt nature that moves, and the last which dies."

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

"Don't discuss yourself, for you are bound to lose; if you belittle yourself, you are believed; if you praise yourself, you are disbelieved."

"Even from their infancy we frame them to the sports of love: their instruction, behavior, attire, grace, learning and all their words azimuth only at love, respects only affection. Their nurses and their keepers imprint no other thing in them."

"Fame and tranquility can never be bedfellows."