People of genius do not excel in any profession because they work in it, they work in it because they excel.
A hypocrite despises those whom he deceives, but has no respect for himself. He would make a dupe of himself too, if he could.
The incentive to ambition is the love of power.
A grave blockhead should always go about with a lively one - they show one another off to the best advantage.
A gentle word, a kind look, a good-natured smile can work wonders and accomplish miracles.
Cunning is the art of concealing our own defects, and discovering other people's weaknesses.
To think ill of mankind and not wish ill to them, is perhaps the highest wisdom and virtue.
Love turns, with a little indulgence, to indifference or disgust hatred alone is immortal.
The seat of knowledge is in the head of wisdom, in the heart. We are sure to judge wrong, if we do not feel right.
The art of pleasing consists in being pleased.
The love of liberty is the love of others the love of power is the love of ourselves.
Rules and models destroy genius and art.
If you think you can win, you can win. Faith is necessary to victory.
Poetry is all that is worth remembering in life.
Learning is its own exceeding great reward.
The perfect joys of heaven do not satisfy the cravings of nature.
We do not see nature with our eyes, but with our understandings and our hearts.
No man is truly great who is great only in his lifetime. The test of greatness is the page of history.
To be capable of steady friendship or lasting love, are the two greatest proofs, not only of goodness of heart, but of strength of mind.
You know more of a road by having traveled it than by all the conjectures and descriptions in the world.
It is not fit that every man should travel it makes a wise man better, and a fool worse.
I would like to spend the whole of my life traveling, if I could anywhere borrow another life to spend at home.
Hope is the best possession. None are completely wretched but those who are without hope. Few are reduced so low as that.
Wit is the salt of conversation, not the food.
Zeal will do more than knowledge.
An honest man speaks the truth, though it may give offence a vain man, in order that it may.
We are very much what others think of us. The reception our observations meet with gives us courage to proceed, or damps our efforts.
Life is the art of being well deceived and in order that the deception may succeed it must be habitual and uninterrupted.
Prosperity is a great teacher adversity a greater.
There are no rules for friendship. It must be left to itself. We cannot force it any more than love.
There is a heroism in crime as well as in virtue. Vice and infamy have their altars and their religion.
Satirists gain the applause of others through fear, not through love.
A wise traveler never despises his own country.