"The flatterer does not think highly enough of himself or of others."

"He who knows how to wait for what he desires does not feel very desperate if he fails in obtaining it; and he, on the contrary, who is very impatient in procuring a certain thing, takes so much pains about it, that, even when he is successful, he does not think himself sufficiently rewarded."

"You think him to be your dupe; if he feigns to be so who is the greater dupe, he or you?"

"Nothing makes us better understand what trifling things Providence thinks He bestows on men in granting them wealth, money, dignities, and other advantages, than the manner in which they are distributed and the kind of men who have the largest share."

"To be among people one loves, that's sufficient; to dream, to speak to them, to be silent among them, to think of indifferent things; but among them, everything is equal."

"They who, without any previous knowledge of us, think amiss of us, do us no harm; they attack not us, but the phantom of their own imagination."

"When life is unhappy it is hard to endure, when it is happy it is terrible to think of it ending. Both amount to the same thing in the end."

"To endeavor to forget anyone is a certain way of thinking of nothing else."

"We should only endeavour to think and speak correctly ourselves, without wishing to bring others over to our taste and opinions."

"It is through madness that we hate an enemy, and think of revenging ourselves; and it is through indolence that we are appeased, and do not revenge ourselves."