and Seneca above all, have not diminished crimes by
their precepts; they have only used them in the building up of pride.
(1665, No. 105.)

XXII.--It is a proof of little friendship not to perceive the growing
coolness of that of our friends. (1666, No. 97.)

XXIII.--The most wise may be so in indifferent and ordinary matters, but
they are seldom so in their most serious affairs. (1665, No. 132.)

XXIV.--The most subtle folly grows out of the most subtle wisdom. (1665,
No. 134.)

XXV.--Sobriety is the love of health, or an incapacity to eat much.
(1665, No. 135.)

XXVI.--We never forget things so well as when we are tired of talking of
them. (1665, No. 144.)

XXVII.--The praise bestowed upon us is at least useful in rooting us in
the practice of virtue. (1665, No. 155.)

XXVIII.--Self-love takes care to prevent him whom we flatter from being
him who most flatters us. (1665, No. 157.)

XXIX.--Men only blame vice and praise virtue from interest. (1665, No.
151.)

XXX.--We make no difference in the kinds of anger, although there is
that which is light and almost innocent, which arises from warmth of
complexion, temperament, and another very criminal, which is, to speak
properly, the fury of pride. (1665, No. 159.)

XXXI.--Great souls are not those who have fewer passions and more
virtues than the common, but those only who have greater designs. (1665,
No. 161.)

XXXII.--Kings do with men as with pieces of money; they make them bear
what value they will, and one is forced to receive them according to
their currency value, and not at their true worth. (1665, No. 165.)

[See Burns{, For A' That An A' That}-- "The rank is but the guinea's
stamp, {The} man's {the gowd} for a' that." Also Farquhar and other
parallel passages pointed out in Familiar Words.]

XXXIII.--Natural ferocity makes fewer people cruel than self-love.
(1665, No. 174.)

XXXIV.--One may say of all our virtues as an Italian poet says of the
propriety of women, that it is often merely the art of appearing chaste.
(1665, No. 176.)

XXXV.--There are crimes which become innocent and even glorious by their
brilliancy,* their number, or their excess; thus it happens that public
robbery is called financial skill, and the unjust capture of provinces
is called a conquest. (1665, No. 192.)

*Some crimes may be excused by their brilliancy, such as
those of Jael, of Deborah, of Brutus, and of Charlotte
Corday--further than this the max