"Oral delivery aims at persuasion and making the listener believe they are converted. Few persons are capable of being convinced; the majority allow themselves to be persuaded."

"To make converts is the natural ambition of everyone."

"There are two things parents should give their children: roots and wings. Roots to give them bearing and a sense of belonging, but also wings to help free them from constraints and prejudices and give them other ways to travel (or rather, to fly)."

"Our passion are the true phoenixes; when the old one is burnt out, a new one rises from its ashes."

"Passions are vices or virtues to their highest powers."

"The philosopher must station themselves in the middle."

"The solution of every problem is another problem"

"Never by reflection, but only by doing is self-knowledge possible to one."

"What is not fully understood is not possessed."

"Thinking is more interesting than knowing, but less interesting than looking"

"The greater the knowledge, the greater the doubt."

"All our knowledge is symbolic."

"People may live as much retired from the world as they like, but sooner or later they find themselves debtor or creditor to some one."

"The little that is completed, vanishes from the sight of one who looks forward to what is still to do."

"Austere perseverance, hash and continuous... rarely fails of its purpose, for its silent power grows irresistible greater with time."

"We can always redeem the man who aspires and strives."

"Secrecy has many advantages, for when you tell someone the purpose of any object right away, they often think there is nothing to it."

"Every spoken word arouses our self-will."

"When ideas fail, words come in very handy."

"The society of women is the element of good manners."

"It is a mistake for a taciturn, serious-minded woman to marry a jovial man, but not for a serious-minded man to marry a lighthearted woman."

"The Woman-Soul leadeth us upward and on!"

"He who does not expect a million readers should not write a line."

"Every author in some degree portrays himself in his works, even if it be against his will."

"Great endowments often announce themselves in youth in the form of singularity and awkwardness."

"If youth is a fault, it is one which is soon corrected"

"Kindness is the golden chain by which society is bound together."

"The senses do not deceive us, but the judgment does."

"Taste is only to be educated by contemplation, not of the tolerably good but of the truly excellent. I therefore show you only the best works; and when you are grounded in these, you will have a standard for the rest, which you will know how to value, without overrating them."

"Whoever wishes to keep a secret must hide the fact that he possesses one."

"If any man wishes to write a clear style, let him first be clear in his thoughts."

"A person places themselves on a level with the ones they praise."

"I do not speak of what I cannot praise."

"When you praise someone you call yourself his equal"

"If you treat an individual... as if he were what he ought to be and could be, he will become what he ought to be and could be."

"He who has a task to perform must know how to take sides, or he is quite unworthy of it."

"If the mass of people hesitate to act, strike with swiftly and with boldness, the brave heart that understands and seizes opportunity can everything."

"I've studied now Philosophy and Jurisprudence, Medicine -- and even, alas! Theology -- from end to end with labor keen; and here, poor fool with all my lore I stand, no wiser than before."

"There is nothing in the world more shameful than establishing one's self on lies and fables."

"When we treat man as he is, we make him worse than he is; when we treat him as if he already were what he potentially could be, we make him what he should be."

"This is the true measure of love: When we believe that we alone can love, that no one could ever have loved so before us, and that no one will ever love in the same way after us"

"It is delivery that makes the orators success."

"Nothing is true, but that which is simple."

"There is repetition everywhere, and nothing is found only once in the world."

"To understand one thing well is better than understanding many things by halves."

"One can be instructed in society, one is inspired only in solitude."

"No one would talk much in society, if he knew how often he misunderstands others"

"Nothing is to be rated higher than the value of the day."

"Talent develops in quiet places, character in the full current of human life."

"Stupidity is without anxiety."