“We trouble our life by thoughts about death, and our death by thoughts about life.”

“Saying is one thing and doing is another”

“If ordinary people complain that I speak too much of myself, I complain that they do not even think of themselves.”

“Other people do not see you at all, but guess at you by uncertain conjectures.”

“Kings and philosophers shit—and so do ladies.”

“There is no desire more natural than the desire of knowledge. (Il n'est desir plus naturel que le desir de connaissance)”

“There is as much difference between us and ourselves as there is between us and others.”

“No man is exempt from saying silly things; the mischief is to say them deliberately.”

“No wind favors he who has no destined port.”

“Why do people respect the package rather than the man?”

“I have never seen a greater monster or miracle than myself.”

“No-one is exempt from speaking nonsense – the only misfortune is to do it solemnly.”

“I know that the arms of friendship are long enough to reach from the one end of the world to the other”

“There is no knowledge so hard to acquire as the knowledge of how to live this life well and naturally.”

“Not being able to govern events, I govern myself”

“Every movement reveals us.”

“[Marriage] happens as with cages: the birds without despair to get in, and those within despair of getting out.”

“Ignorance is the softest pillow on which a man can rest his head”

“When I dance, I dance; when I sleep, I sleep; yes, and when I walk alone in a beautiful orchard, if my thoughts drift to far-off matters for some part of the time for some other part I lead them back again to the walk, the orchard, to the sweetness of this solitude, to myself.”

“He who establishes his argument by noise and command, shows that his reason is weak.”

“I do not believe, from what I have been told about this people, that there is anything barbarous or savage about them, except that we all call barbarous anything that is contrary to our own habits.”

“Every man has within himself the entire human condition”

“The most fruitful and natural exercise for our minds is, in my opinion, conversation.”

“Confidence in others' honesty is no light testimony of one's own integrity.”