"Ah that I-- You would have it so, you would have it so; George Dandin, you would have it so! This suits you very nicely, and you are served right; you have precisely what you deserve."

George Dandin. Act i. Sc. 19.

"I am addressing myself--I am addressing myself to my cap."

L'Avare. Act i. Sc. 3.

"The beautiful eyes of my cash-box."

L'Avare. Act v. Sc. 3.

"You are speaking before a man to whom all Naples is known."

L'Avare. Act v. Sc. 5.

"My fair one, let us swear an eternal friendship."

Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme. Act iv. Sc. 1.

"I will maintain it before the whole world."

Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme. Act iv. Sc. 5.

"What the devil did he want in that galley?"

Les Fourberies de Scapin. Act ii. Sc. 11.

"Grammar, which knows how to control even kings."

Les Femmes savantes. Act ii. Sc. 6.

"Ah, there are no longer any children!"

Le Malade Imaginaire. Act ii. Sc. 11.

"Man is but a reed, the weakest in nature, but he is a thinking reed."

Thoughts. Chap. ii. 10.

"It is not permitted to the most equitable of men to be a judge in his own cause."

Thoughts. Chap. iv. 1.

"Montaigne is wrong in declaring that custom ought to be followed simply because it is custom, and not because it is reasonable or just."

Thoughts. Chap. iv. 6.

"Thus we never live, but we hope to live; and always disposing ourselves to be happy, it is inevitable that we never become so."

Thoughts. Chap. v. 2.

"If the nose of Cleopatra had been shorter, the whole face of the earth would have been changed."

Thoughts. Chap. viii. 29.

"The last thing that we find in making a book is to know what we must put first."

Thoughts. Chap. ix. 30.

"Rivers are highways that move on, and bear us whither we wish to go."

Thoughts. Chap. ix. 38.

"What a chimera, then, is man! what a novelty, what a monster, what a chaos, what a subject of contradiction, what a prodigy! A judge of all things, feeble worm of the earth, depositary of the truth, cloaca of uncertainty and error, the glory and the shame of the universe!"

Thoughts. Chap. x. 1.

"We know the truth, not only by the reason, but also by the heart."

Thoughts. Chap. x. 1.

"For as old age is that period of life most remote from infancy, who does not see that old age in this universal man ought not to be sought in the times nearest his birth, but in those most remote from it?"

Preface to the Treatise on Vacuum.

"Every age has its pleasures, its style of wit, and its own ways."

The Art of Poetry. Canto iii. Line 374.

"He [Molière] pleases all the world, but cannot please himself."

Satire 2.

""There, take," says Justice, "take ye each a shell; We thrive at Westminster on fools like you. 'T was a fat oyster! live in peace,--adieu.""

Epître ii.

"It may be said that his wit shines at the expense of his memory."

Gil Blas. Book iii. Chap. xi.

"I wish you all sorts of prosperity with a little more taste."

Gil Blas. Book vii. Chap. iv.

"Isocrates was in the right to insinuate, in his elegant Greek expression, that what is got over the Devil's back is spent under his belly."

Gil Blas. Book viii. Chap. ix.

"Plain as a pike-staff."

Gil Blas. Book xii. Chap. viii.

"If there were no God, it would be necessary to invent him."

Epître à l'Auteur du Livre des Trois Imposteurs. cxi.

"The king [Frederic] has sent me some of his dirty linen to wash; I will wash yours another time."

Reply to General Manstein.

"Men use thought only as authority for their injustice, and employ speech only to conceal their thoughts."

Dialogue xiv. Le Chapon et la Poularde (1763).

"History is little else than a picture of human crimes and misfortunes."

L'Ingénu. Chap. x. (1767.)

"The first who was king was a fortunate soldier: Who serves his country well has no need of ancestors."

Merope. Act i. Sc. 3.

"In the best of possible worlds the château of monseigneur the baron was the most beautiful of châteaux, and madame the best of possible baronesses."

Candide. Chap. i.

"In this country [England] it is well to kill from time to time an admiral to encourage the others."

Candide. Chap. xxiii.

"The superfluous, a very necessary thing."

Le Mondain. Line 21.

"Crush the infamous thing."

Letter to d'Alembert, June 23, 1760.

"There are truths which are not for all men, nor for all times."

Letter to Cardinal de Bernis, April 23, 1761.

"The proper mean."

Letter to Count d'Argental, Nov. 28, 1765.

"It is said that God is always on the side of the heaviest battalions."

Letter to M. le Riche, Feb. 6, 1770.

"Love truth, but pardon error."

Discours sur l'Homme. Discours 3.

"It is only the first step which costs."

In reply to the Cardinal de Polignac.

"Days of absence, sad and dreary, Clothed in sorrow's dark array,-- Days of absence, I am weary: She I love is far away."

Days of Absence.

"We read of a certain Roman emperor who built a magnificent palace. In digging the foundation, the workmen discovered a golden sarcophagus ornamented with three circlets, on which were inscribed, "I have expended; I have given; I have kept; I have possessed; I do possess; I have lost; I am punished. What I formerly expended, I have; what I gave away, I have.""

Tale xvi.

"See how the world rewards its votaries."

Tale xxxvi.

"If the end be well, all is well."

Tale lxvii.

"Whatever you do, do wisely, and think of the consequences."

Tale ciii.

"Great thoughts come from the heart."

Maxim cxxvii.

"O Richard! O my king! The universe forsakes thee!"

Sung at the Dinner given to the French Soldiers in the Opera Salon at Versailles, Oct. 1, 1789.

"Who never ate his bread in sorrow, Who never spent the darksome hours Weeping, and watching for the morrow,-- He knows ye not, ye gloomy Powers."

Wilhelm Meister. Book ii. Chap. xiii.

"Know'st thou the land where the lemon-trees bloom, Where the gold orange glows in the deep thicket's gloom, Where a wind ever soft from the blue heaven blows, And the groves of laurel and myrtle and rose?"

Wilhelm Meister. Book iii. Chap. i.

"Art is long, life short; judgment difficult, opportunity transient."

Wilhelm Meister. Book vii. Chap. ix.