 Vice, in its true light, is so deformed, that it shocks us at first sight; and would hardly ever seduce us, if it did not at first wear the mask of some virtue. |
| A weak mind is like a microscope, which magnifies trifling things, but cannot receive great ones. |
| Men, as well as women, are much oftener led by their hearts than by their understandings. |
| Pleasure is a necessary reciprocal. No one feels, who does not at the same time give it. To be pleased, one must please. What pleases you in others, will in general please them in you. |
| Wit is so shining a quality that everybody admires it; most people aim at it, all people fear it, and few love it unless in themselves. A man must have a good share of wit himself to endure a great share of it in another. |
| Modesty is the only sure bait when you angle for praise. |
| Knowledge may give weight, but accomplishments give luster, and many more people see than weigh. |
| Let them show me a cottage where there are not the same vices of which they accuse the courts. |
| Distrust all those who love you extremely upon a very slight acquaintance and without any visible reason. |
| Take the tone of the company you are in. |
| In my mind, there is nothing so illiberal, and so ill-bred, as audible laughter. |
| To govern mankind, one must not overrate them. |
| Knowledge of the world in only to be acquired in the world, and not in a closet. |
| The difference between a man of sense and a fop is that the fop values himself upon his dress; and the man of sense laughs at it, at the same time he knows he must not neglect it. |
| Being pretty on the inside means you don't hit your brother and you eat all your peas - that's what my grandma taught me. |
| Custom has made dancing sometimes necessary for a young man; therefore mind it while you learn it, that you may learn to do it well, and not be ridiculous, though in a ridiculous act. |
| Good humor is the health of the soul, sadness is its poison. |
| Never seem more learned than the people you are with. Wear your learning like a pocket watch and keep it hidden. Do not pull it out to count the hours, but give the time when you are asked. |
| A man of sense only trifles with them, plays with them, humors and flatters them, as he does with a sprightly and forward child; but he neither consults them about, nor trusts them with, serious matters. |
| There is nothing that people bear more impatiently, or forgive less, than contempt: and an injury is much sooner forgotten than an insult. |
