One half of the children born die before their eighth year. This is nature's law; why try to contradict it?

Conscience is the voice of the soul; the passions are the voice of the body.

Innocence is ashamed of nothing.

Smell is the sense of memory and desire.

All kinds of frankness and honesty are terrible crimes in the eyes of society.

A man speaks of what he knows, a woman of what pleases her: the one requires knowledge, the other taste.

God makes all things good; man meddles with them and they become evil.

He who is the most slow in making a promise is the most faithful in the performance of it.

He who pretends to look upon death without fear, lies.

However great a man's natural talent may be, the act of writing cannot be learned all at once.

I have always said and felt that true enjoyment can not be described.

Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains.

Nature never deceives us; it is always we who deceive ourselves.

Nothing is less in our power than the heart, and far from commanding we are forced to obey it.