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Could we know what men are most apt to remember, we might know what they are most apt to do.

Human nature is the same all the world over.

Man, as he is, is not a genuine article. He is an imitation of something, and a very bad imitation.

Human nature is not a machine to be built after a model, and set to do exactly the work prescribed for it, but a tree, which requires to grow and develop itself on all sides, according to the tendency of the inward forces which make it a living thing.

The tendency of human nature to good is like the tendency of water to flow downwards. All people have this tendency to good, just as all water flows downwards. Now, by striking water and causing it to leap up, you may make it go over your forehead, and, by damming and leading it, you may force it up a hill; -- but are such movements according to the nature of water? It is just the force applied that causes them. When people are made to do what is not good, their nature is being dealt with in this same way.

We are all murderers and prostitutes -- no matter to what culture, society, class, nation one belongs, no matter how normal, moral, or mature, one takes oneself to be.

Even when a man acts ungrateful, it is often his benefactor who is more deserving of being labeled as disgraceful.

Now I believe I can hear the philosophers protesting that it can only be misery to live in folly, illusion, deception and ignorance, but it isn't -- it's human.

In a tavern everybody puts on airs except the landlord.

Strange is our situation here on earth. Each of us comes for a short visit, not knowing why, yet sometimes seeming to divine a purpose.