Adversity is a great teacher, but this teacher makes us pay dearly for its instruction; and often the profit we derive, is not worth the price we paid.

Children

The training of children is a profession, where we must know how to waste time in order to save it"

Conscience

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

Education

We are born weak, we need strength; helpless, we need aid; foolish, we need reason. All that we lack at birth, all that we need when we come to man's estate, is the gift of education.

Evil

Our greatest evils flow from ourselves.

Freedom

A country cannot subsist well without liberty, nor liberty without virtue.

Goodness

Our will is always for our own good, but we do not always see what that is.

Guilt

Whoever blushes confesses guilt, true innocence never feels shame.

Heroes and Heroism

How many famous and high-spirited heroes have lived a day too long?

Judgment and Judges

Do not judge, and you will never be mistaken.

Love

Our affections as well as our bodies are in perpetual flux.

Modesty

Although modesty is natural to man, it is not natural to children. Modesty only begins with the knowledge of evil.

Nations

Most nations, as well as people are impossible only in their youth; they become incorrigible as they grow older.

Promises

Those that are most slow in making a promise are the most faithful in the performance of it.

Silence

Absolute silence leads to sadness. It is the image of death.

Sympathy

We pity in others only the those evils which we ourselves have experienced.

Virtue

Virtue is a state of war, and to live in it we have always to combat with ourselves.

Work

It is too difficult to think nobly when one thinks only of earning a living.