Have you forgotten that love, like medicine, is simply the art of aiding nature?

I need only to be shown my mistakes and I never rest until I have retrieved them.

Fools are here below for our minor pleasures.

Who can wish for happiness that is bought at the price of reason, whose fleeting pleasures are at least followed by regret, if not remorse?

Indeed, if first loves appear in general more virtuous and, as they say, more chaste; if they are at least slower in their progress; it is not, as people think, from delicacy or timidity, but because the heart, surprised by an unknown sentiment, hesitates as it were at every step to enjoy the charm it feels, and because this charm is so powerful upon a fresh heart that it forgets every other pleasure.

Love, hatred, you have only to choose; they all sleep under the same roof; you can double your existence, caress with one hand and strike with the other.

Now I mention neglect, you resemble those who send regularly to inquire of the state of health of their sick friends, and who never concern themselves about the answer.

I had to flatter them the whole evening to appease them; for old women must not be angered – they make young women’s reputations.

One should only permit excess with those one intends to leave soon.

My thoughts were my own, and I was exasperated to have them either surprised or drawn from me against my will.