Absolute Power Can Only Be Supported By

Never Yield To That Temptation, Which, To Most Young Men, Is Very Strong, Of Exposing Other People's Weaknesses And Infirmities, For The Sake Either Of Diverting The Company, Or Of Showing Your Own Superiority. You May Get The Laugh On Your Side By It For The Present; But You Will Make Enemies By It For Ever; And Even Those Who Laugh With You Then, Will, Upon Reflection, Fear, And Consequently Hate You.

I Really Think Next To The Consciousness Of Doing A Good Action, That Of Doing A Civil One Is The Most Pleasing; And The Epithet Which I Should Covet The Most Next To That Of Aristides, Would Be That Of Well-bred.

Men Are Apt To Mistake, Or At Least To Seem To Mistake, Their Own Talents, In Hopes, Perhaps, Of Misleading Others To Allow Them That Which They Are Conscious They Do Not Possess. Thus Lord Hardwicke Valued Himself More Upon Being A Great Minister Of State, Which He Certainly Was Not, Than Upon Being A Great Magistrate, Which He Certainly Was.

To This Principle Of Vanity, Which Philosophers Call A Mean One, And Which I Do Not, I Owe A Great Part Of The Figure Which I Have Made In Life.

Mankind Is Made Up Of Inconsistencies, And No Man Acts Invariably Up To His Predominant Character. The Wisest Man Sometimes Acts Weakly, And The Weakest Sometimes Wisely.