“Great commanders write their actions with simplicity; because they receive more glory from facts than from words.”

No kingdom has shed more blood than the kingdom of Christ.

Religious wars are not caused by the fact that there is more than one religion, but by the spirit of intolerance… the spread of which can only be regarded as the total eclipse of human reason.

The incomparable stupidity of life teaches us to love our parents; divine philosophy teaches us to forgive them.

Man is a social animal formed to please in society.

Sometimes a man who deserves to be looked upon because he is a fool is despised only because he is a lawyer.

The laws do not take upon them to punish any other than overt acts.

Those who have few affairs to attend to are great speakers. The less men think, the more they talk.

As virtue is necessary in a republic, and honor in a monarchy, fear is what is required in a despotism. As for virtue, it is not at all necessary, and honor would be dangerous there.

Mediocrity is a hand-rail.

Useless laws weaken the necessary laws.

When a government lasts a long while, it deteriorates by insensible degrees. Republics end through luxury, monarchies through poverty.

It is clear that in a monarchy, where he who commands the exceution of the laws generally thinks himself above them, there is lessneed of virtue than in a popular government, where the person entrusted with the execution of the laws is sensible of his being subject to their direction.

Power should be a check on power.

I shall ever repeat it, that mankind are governed not by extremes, but by principals of moderation.

If the triangles made a god, they would give him three sides.

False happiness renders men stern and proud, and that happiness is never communicated. True happiness renders them kind and sensible, and that happiness is always shared.

Blues is a natural fact, is something that a fellow lives. If you don’t live it you don’t have it.

Round about the accredited and orderly facts of every science there ever floats a sort of dustcloud of exceptional observations, of occurrences minute and irregular and seldom met with, which it always proves more easy to ignore than to attend to.

Evolution is a theory, and it’s a theory that you can test. We’ve tested evolution in many ways. You can’t present good evidence that says evolution is not a fact.

If there’s any mystery to me at all, it’s probably due to the fact that I’m not online and don’t go to conventions–which means that I’m probably not as accessible to fans as most writers are these days. If that makes me seem like a weird recluse, so be it.

The fact is that the Vietnamese held Americans after 1973.

A common misconception is that the costs of health care are cheaper in rural America, when in fact the reality is that they are more expensive and more difficult to access.

The single fact of existing is already a true happiness.

In fact, so much of life, as you know, is serendipitous. That’s why you better be prepared at any time for anything, because it may happen to you.