“We promise according to our hopes and perform according to our fears.”

When we disclaim praise, it is only showing our desire to be praised a second time.

What men have called friendship is only a social arrangement, a mutual adjustment of interests, an interchange of services given and received; it is.

Gratitude is merely the secret hope of further favors.

Decency is the least of all laws, but yet it is the law which is most strictly observed.

Why can we remember the tiniest detail that has happened to us, and not remember how many times we have told it to the same person.

The one thing people are the most liberal with, is their advice.

He who lives without folly isn’t so wise as he thinks.

Heat of blood makes young people change their inclinations often, and habit makes old ones keep to theirs a great while.

There are few virtuous women who are not bored with their trade.

True love is like ghosts, which everyone talks about and few have seen.

Hope, deceiving as it is, serves at least to lead us to the end of our lives by an agreeable route.

What makes the pain we feel from shame and jealousy so cutting is that vanity can give us no assistance in bearing them.

It is almost always a fault of one who loves not to realize when he ceases to be loved.

Everyone complains of his memory, and nobody complains of his judgment.

It is easier to know men in general, than men in particular.

We seldom find people ungrateful so long as it is thought we can serve them.