All Permanent Decisions Are Made

Whatever Is Enforced By Command Is More Imputed To Him Who Exacts Than To Him Who Performs.

We Have The Pleasures Suitable To Our Lot; Let Us Not Usurp Those Of Greatness. Ours Are More Natural And All The More Solid And Sure For Being Humbler. Since We Will Not Do So Out Of Conscience, At Least Out Of Ambition Let Us Reject Ambition.

I Moreover Affirm That Our Wisdom Itself, And Wisest Consultations, For The Most Part Commit Themselves To The Conduct Of Chance.

I Find No Quality So Easy For A Man To Counterfeit As Devotion, Though His Life And Manner Are Not Conformable To It; The Essence Of It Is Abstruse And Occult, But The Appearances Easy And Showy.

We Ought To Love Temperance For Itself, And In Obedience To God Who Has Commanded It And Chastity; But What I Am Forced To By Catarrhs, Or Owe To The Stone, Is Neither Chastity Nor Temperance.