All our knowledge begins with the senses, proceeds then to the understanding, and ends with reason. There is nothing higher than reason.

Jealousy is the tribute mediocrity pays to genius.

There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self.

We sometimes congratulate ourselves at the moment of waking from a troubled dream; it may be so the moment after death.

The greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as of the greatest virtues.

Anywhere you go in the world is what you make of it, not what you read in books.

Why fit in when you were born to stand out?

Nothing is as easy as it looks.

In a good bookroom you feel in some mysterious way that you are absorbing the wisdom contained in all the books through your skin, without even opening them.

To avoid criticism say nothing, do nothing, be nothing.

Fear doesn't exist anywhere except in the mind.

Peace is not an absence of war, it is a virtue, a state of mind, a disposition for benevolence, confidence, justice.

The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him.

Never pick a fight with an ugly person, they've got nothing to lose.

You always admire what you really don't understand.

Only from the heart can you touch the sky.

Science has not yet taught us if madness is or is not the sublimity of the intelligence.

Drop the idea that you are Atlas carrying the world on your shoulders. The world would go on even without you. Don't take yourself so seriously.

Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they shall be satisfied.

The absent are never without fault, nor the present without excuse.

We must live together as brothers or perish together as fools.