“If one only wished to be happy, this could be easily accomplished; but we wish to be happier than other people, and this is always difficult, for we believe others to be happier than they are.”

“If only we wanted to be happy, it would be easy; but we want to be happier than other people, which is difficult, since we think them happier than they are.”

“The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality of happiness, and by no means a necessity of life.”

“...when the laws have ceased to be executed, as this can only come from the corruption of the republic, the state is already lost.”

“One more organ or one less in our body would give us a different intelligence. In fact, all the established laws as to why our body is a certain way would be different if our body were not that way.”

“There is little consolation in the fact that millions of people are unhappier than we are. Why should other people's misery make us happier or more content?”

“I don't think two people could have been happier than we have been.”