“If I held all the thoughts of the world in my hand, I would be careful not to open it.”

A well-cultivated mind is, so to speak, made up of all the minds of preceding ages; it is only one single mind which has been educated during all this time.

A man finds no sweeter voice in all the world than that which chants his praise.

In vain we shall penetrate more and more deeply the secrets of the structure of the human body, we shall not dupe nature; we shall die as usual.

Let us be well assured of the Matter of Fact, before we trouble our selves with enquiring into the Cause. It is true, that this Method is too slow for the greatest part of Mankind, who run naturally to the Cause, and pass over the Truth of the Matter of Fact.

Ah! si l’on o” tait les chime’ res aux hommes, quel plaisir leur resterait? Oh! If man were robbed of his fantasies, what pleasure would be left him?

I hate war, for it spoils conversation.

Nature intends that, at fixed periods, men should succeed each other by the instrumentality of death. We shall never outwit Nature; we shall die as usual.

Modesty in women has two special advantages,–it enhances beauty and veils uncomeliness.

Behold a universe so immense that I am lost in it. I no longer know where I am. I am just nothing at all. Our world is terrifying in its insignificance.

I shall leave the world without regret, for it hardly contains a single good listener.

I detest war; it ruins conversation

The Art of Flying is but newly invented, twill improve by degrees, and in time grow perfect; then we may fly as far as the Moon.

It is a great obstacle to happiness to expect too much.

There is nothing one sees oftener than the ridiculous and magnificent, such close neighbors that they touch.

To despise theory is to have the excessively vain pretension to do without knowing what one does, and to speak without knowing what one says.

It is high time for me to depart, for at my age I now begin to see things as they really are.

In terms of personal choices, let’s all think more carefully about where we get our protein from.

Your conscience is the measure of the honesty of your selfishness. Listen to it carefully.

You might not have the things you want, but if you check carefully, you got all you need.

Even very young children need to be informed about dying. Explain the concept of death very carefully to your child. This will make threatening him with it much more effective.

In fiction writing ideas have to be handled extremely carefully.

Some of it is carefully structured and well-thought-out. That’s where the real danger lies.

Carefully watch how people live, get an intuitive sense as to what they might want and then go with it.

He was also removing all traces of any tiny leftover parts, and suddenly a ritual which I’d always found incestuous and gross seemed to me more like a desperate act on Joseph’s part to get out, to leave, to extract every little last remnant and bring it into open air.