“Reverend Fathers, my letters do not customarily follow one another so closely, nor are they usually so extensive. The little time I have had has caused both. I have made this one longer only because I have not had the leisure of making it shorter.”

“I have only made this letter longer because I have not had the time to make it shorter."(Letter 16, 1657)”

“I made this [letter] very long, because I did not have the leisure to make it shorter.”

“I would have written a shorter letter, but I did not have the time.”

“Please forgive the long letter; I didn’t have time to write a short one.”

“The weather and my mood have little connection. I have my foggy and my fine days within me; my prosperity or misfortune has little to do with the matter.”

“We know the existence of the infinite without knowing its nature, because it too has extension but unlike us no limits.But we do not know either the existence or the nature of God, because he has neither extension nor limits.”