If you want to win friends, make it a point to remember them. If you remember my name, you pay me a subtle compliment; you indicate that I have made an impression on you. Remember my name and you add to my feeling of importance.

Minds of moderate caliber ordinarily condemn everything which is beyond their range.

In the republic of mediocrity genius is dangerous.

Solitude, the safeguard of mediocrity.

The true spirit of delight, the exaltation, the sense of being more than Man, which is the touchstone of the highest excellence, is to be found in mathematics as surely as in poetry.

Equations are just the boring part of mathematics. I attempt to see things in terms of geometry.

To be always thinking about your manners is not the way to make them good; the very perfection of manners is not to think about yourself.

Those that are good manners at the court are as ridiculous in the country, as the behavior of the country is most mockable at the court.

Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve.

Better were it to be unborn than to be ill bred.