Such is the nature of men, that howsoever they may acknowledge many others to be more witty, or more eloquent, or more learned; yet they will hardly believe there be many so wise as themselves.

It is not wisdom but Authority that makes a law.

Prudence is but experience, which equal time, equally bestows on all men, in those things they equally apply themselves unto.

It is not wisdom but Authority that makes a law.

Force and fraud are in war the two cardinal virtues.

During the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that conditions called war; and such a war, as if of every man, against every man.

I put for the general inclination of all mankind, a perpetual and restless desire of power after power, that ceaseth only in death.

When all the world is overcharged with inhabitants, then the last remedy of all is war, which provideth for every man, by victory or death.

The disembodied spirit is immortal; there is nothing of it that can grow old or die. But the embodied spirit sees death on the horizon as soon as its day dawns.

Fear of things invisible in the natural seed of that which everyone in himself calleth religion.

The right of nature... is the liberty each man hath to use his own power, as he will himself, for the preservation of his own nature; that is to say, of his own life.

The obligation of subjects to the sovereign is understood to last as long, and no longer, than the power lasteth by which he is able to protect them.

In the state of nature profit is the measure of right.