“Alas, it is when we are beginning to leave this mortal body that it most offends us!”

Everything is good as it comes from the hands of the Maker of the world, but degenerates once it gets into the hands of man

Happiness requires three things, a good bank account, a good cook, and good digestion.

The real world has its limits; the imaginary world is infinite. Unable to enlarge the one, let us restrict the other, for it is from the difference between the two alone that are born all the pains which make us truly unhappy.

MAN is born free; and everywhere he is in chains. One thinks himself the master of others, and still remains a greater slave than they.

MAN is born free; and everywhere he is in chains. One thinks himself the master of others, and still remains a greater slave than they.

The man who meditates is a depraved animal.

Man was born free, and he is everywhere in chains. Those who think themselves the masters of others are indeed greater slaves than they.

In truth, laws are always useful to those with possessions and harmful to those who have nothing; from which it follows that the social state is advantageous to men only when all possess something and none has too much.

Every person has a right to risk their own life for the preservation of it.

There is peace in dungeons, but is that enough to make dungeons desirable?

I perceive God everywhere in His works. I sense Him in me; I see Him all around me.

Man’s first law is to watch over his own preservation; his first care he owes to himself; and as soon as he reaches the age of reason, he becomes the only judge of the best means to preserve himself; he becomes his own master.

Trust your heart rather than your head.

The people of England regards itself as free; but it is grossly mistaken; it is free only during the election of members of parliament. As soon as they are elected, slavery overtakes it, and it is nothing.

Nothing on this earth is worth buying at the price of human blood.

I would rather be a man of paradoxes than a man of prejudices.

Friendships begun in this world will be taken up again, never to be broken off.

The beginning of a habit is like an invisible thread, but every time we repeat the act we strengthen the strand, add to it another filament, until it becomes a great cable and binds us irrevocably thought and act.

You are something new in this world. Never before, since the beginning of time, has there ever been anybody exactly like you; and never again throughout all the ages to come will there ever be anybody exactly like you again.

Beginning well is a momentary thing; finishing well is a lifelong thing.

God’s LOVE is Like an Ocean; You can See its Beginning, but not its end.

Logic is the beginning of wisdom, not the end.

The greatest romance is with the Infinite. You have no idea how beautiful life can be. When you suddenly find God everywhere, when He comes and talks to you and guides you, the romance of divine love has begun.

In the beginning, there were no reasons; there were only causes. Nothing had a purpose, nothing has so much as a function; there was no teleology in the world at all.