La reconnaissance de la plupart des hommes n'est qu'une secrète envie de recevoir de plus grands bienfaits. - François de La Rochefoucauld

Though the gifts of the mind are infinite, they can, it seems to me, be thus classified. There are some so beautiful that everyone can see and feel their beauty. There are some lovely, it is true, but which are wearisome. There are some which are lovely, which all the world admire, but without knowing why. There are some so refined and delicate that few are capable even of remarking all their beauties. There are others which, though imperfect, yet are produced with such skill, and sustained and managed with such sense and grace, that they even deserve to be admired.

93. — Old men delight in giving good advice as a consolation for the fact that they can no longer set bad examples.

What the Italian poet has said of the virtue of women, namely that it is often simply the art of looking virtuous, can be applied to all our virtues