“A man, when he undertakes a journey, has, in general the end in view; a woman thinks more of the incidental occurrences, the strange things that may possibly occur on the road.”

True sensibility, the sensibility which is the auxiliary of virtue, and the soul of genius, is in society so occupied with the feelings of others, as scarcely to regard its own sensations.

Let woman share the rights, and she will emulate the virtues of man; for she must grow more perfect when emancipated, or justify the authority that chains such a weak being to her duty.

Women are systematically degraded by receiving the trivial attentions which men think it manly to pay to their sex, when, in fact, men are insultingly supporting their own superiority.

Few, I believe, have had much affection for mankind, who did not first love their parents, their brothers, sisters, and even the domestic brutes, whom they first played with.

We must all be in love once in our lives.

The man who had some virtue whilst he was struggling for a crown, often becomes a voluptuous tyrant when it graces his brow.

Friendship is a serious affection; the most sublime of all affections, because it is founded on principle, and cemented by time.

I gazed around with rapture, and felt more of that spontaneous pleasure which gives credibility to our expectation of happiness than I had for a long, long time before.

Men of genius and talents have started out of a class, in which women have never yet been placed.

Some women govern their husbands without degrading themselves, because intellect will always govern.

Let us eat, drink, and love for tomorrow we die, would be in fact the language of reason, the morality of life; and who but a fool would part with a reality for a fleeting shadow?

Only by the jostlings of equality can we form a just opinion of ourselves.

Men, indeed, appear to me to act in a very unphilosophical manner when they try to secure the good conduct of women by attempting to keep them always in a state of childhood.

Like the flowers that are planted in too rich a soil, strength and usefulness are sacrificed to beauty.

The greater number of people take their opinions on trust, to avoid the trouble of exercising their own minds, and these indolent beings naturally adhere to the letter, rather than the spirit of a law, divine or human.

I never wanted but your heart-that gone, you have nothing more to give.

It is the wise man’s part to leave in darkness everything that is ugly.

One of the greatest discoveries a man makes, one of his great surprises, is to find he can do what he was afraid he couldn’t do.

It is only the truth that can make a man free, it is only the truth that can make a man live.

A man’s usefulness depends upon his living up to his ideals insofar as he can.

Money is the alienated essence of man’s labor and life; and this alien essence dominates him as he worships it.

Light may be shed on man and his origins.

Call no man happy till he is dead.

How strange and foolish is man. He looses his health in gaining wealth. Then to regain health he wastes his wealth.