"To write a good love letter, you ought to begin without knowing what you mean to say, and to finish without knowing what you have said."

"Everything is in a state of flux on this earth. Nothing keeps a form for long, and our affections, which are attached to external things, pass and change as they do."

"The true founder of civil society was the first man who, having enclosed a plot of land, took it into his head to say 'This is mine' and found people simple enough to believe him."

"The more I see of men, the more I admire dogs."

"As soon as any man says of the affairs of the State 'What does it matter to me?' the State may be given up for lost."