"The severity of punishments is more dangerous to liberty than the state of nature itself."

"In republican governments, men are all equal; equal they are also in despotic governments: in the former, because they are everything; in the latter, because they are nothing."

"The English love liberty so much that they are always ready to sacrifice it to their interests."

"It is not the young people that degenerate; they are only open to the impressions of others; it is the old people that are corrupt, and have corrupted them."

"As for the law of nations, it is founded on this principle, that the various nations ought to do each other in times of peace the most good possible, and in times of war the least evil possible, witho…"