Patriotism is an ephemeral motive that scarcely ever outlasts the particular threat to society that aroused it.

Nothing is more narrow-minded than chauvinism or racial hatred. To me all men are equal; there are flatheads everywhere and I despise them all equally.

All of life is a foreign country.

Who sees all beings in his own self, and his own self in all beings, loses all fear.

By nature, men are nearly alike; by practice, they get to be wide apart.

There are chance meetings with strangers that interest us from the first moment, before a word is spoken.

No man has any natural authority over his fellow man.

Of troubles none is greater than to be robbed of one’s native land.

Many need no other provocation to enmity than that they find themselves excelled.

Such then is the human state, that to wish greatness for one’s country is to wish harm to one’s neighbors.

“Abroad,” that large home of ruined reputations.

In settling an island, the first building erected by a Spaniard will be a church, by a Frenchman a fort, by a Dutchman a warehouse, and by an Englishman an alehouse.