"Arithmetic is a kind of knowledge in which the best natures should be trained, and which must not be given up."

"It is the task of the enlightened not only to ascend to learning and to see the good but to be willing to descend again to those prisoners and to share their troubles and their honors, whether they are worth having or not. And this they must do, even with the prospect of death."

"If the truth of all things that are is always in our soul, then the soul must be immortal, so you should take courage and whatever you do not happen to know, that is to remember, at present, you must endeavor to discover and recollect I cannot swear to everything I have said in this argument but one thing I am ready to fight for in word and deed, that we shall be better, braver and more active men if we believe it right to look for what we do not know, than if we think we cannot discover it and have no duty to seek it."

"Harmony is a symphony, and symphony is an agreement; but an agreement of disagreements while they disagree there cannot be; you cannot harmonize that which disagrees."

"The plan grows under the author's hand; new thoughts occur to him in the act of writing; he has not worked out the argument to the end before he begins."

"Ideas are the source of all things."

"Democracy is a charming form of government, full of variety and disorder, and dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequal alike."

"It is only just that anything that up on its own should feel it has nothing to repay for an upbringing which it owes no one."

"No human thing is of serious importance."

"Lack of activity destroys the good condition of every human being."