The worst thing you can possibly do is worrying and thinking about what you could have done

Most men of education are more superstitious than they admit - nay, than they think

A good metaphor is something even the police should keep an eye on

The most dangerous of all falsehoods is a slightly distorted truth

Much can be inferred about a man from his mistress: in her one beholds his weaknesses and his dreams

Man loves company even if it is only that of a small burning candle

Some people read because they are too lazy to think

To read means to borrow; to create out of one's readings is paying off one's debts

Everyone is a genius at least once a year. The real geniuses simply have their bright ideas closer together

One must judge men not by their opinions, but by what their opinions have made of them

One might call habit a moral friction: something that prevents the mind from gliding over things but connects it with them and makes it hard for it to free itself from them

The human tendency to regard little things as important has produced very many great things

Never undertake anything for which you wouldn't have the courage to ask the blessings of heaven

Men still have to be governed by deception

To be content with life, or to live merrily, rather, all that is required is that we bestow on all things only a fleeting, superficial glance; the more thoughtful we become the more earnest we grow

If there were only turnips and potatoes in the world, someone would complain that plants grow the wrong way.

There is no greater impediment to progress in the sciences than the desire to see it take place too quickly

A person reveals his character by nothing so clearly as the joke he resents

He who is in love with himself has at least this advantage, he won't encounter many rivals.

One's first step in wisdom is to question everything - and one's last is to come to terms with everything