"The perfect state is one where men weep and rejoice over the same things."

"All is flux, nothing stays still."

"Appearance tyrannizes over truth."

"Nothing can be more absurd than the practice that prevails in our country of men and women not following the same pursuits with all their strengths and with one mind, for thus, the state instead of being whole is reduced to half."

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

"The thing to be done does not choose, I imagine, to tarry the leisure of the doer, but the doer must be at the beck of the thing to be done, and not treat it as a secondary affair."

"Laws are partly formed for the sake of good men, in order to instruct them how they may live on friendly terms with one another, and partly for the sake of those who refuse to be instructed, whose spirit cannot be subdued, or softened, or hindered from plunging into evil."

"Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, a charm to sadness, gaiety and life to everything. It is the essence of order, and leads to all that is god, just, and beautiful, of which it is the invisible, but never less, dazzling, passionate, and eternal form."

"This feeling of wonder shows that you are a philosopher, since wonder is the only beginning of philosophy."

"We ought to esteem it of the greatest importance that the fictions which children first hear should be adapted in the most perfect manner to the promotion of virtue."