We call them dumb animals, and so they are, for they cannot tell us how they feel, but they do not suffer less because they have no words.

There be beasts that, at a year old, observe more, and pursue that which is for their good more prudently, than a child can do at ten.

Man is a noble animal, splendid in ashes and pompous in the grave.

Weaseling out of things is important to learn. It’s what separates us from the animals—except the weasel.

How like to us is that filthy beast the ape.

The elephant, although a gross beast, is yet the most decent and most sensible of any other upon earth. Although he never changes his female, and hath so tender a love for her whom he hath chosen, yet he never couples with her but at the end of every three years, and then only for the space of five days.

Animals are in possession of themselves; their soul is in possession of their body. But they have no right to their life, because they do not will it. 

Histories are more full of examples of the fidelity of dogs than of friends.

A good dog, sir, deserves a good bone.

Life is no way to treat an animal.

Animals are good to think with.

Man is the only animal that laughs and weeps, for he is the only animal that is struck with the difference between what things are and what they ought to be.

Animals have these advantages over man: they never hear the clock strike, they die without any idea of death, they have no theologians to instruct them, their last moments are not disturbed by unwelcome and unpleasant ceremonies, their funerals cost them nothing, and no one starts lawsuits over their wills.