This idea was one of vengeance to me, and I tasted it slowly in the night of my dungeon and the despair of my captivity.
What the count said was true – the most curious spectacle in life is that of death.
Where did I meet him before – this buckbasket of fat, this full-moon face of purple, and this carriage of a sacred elephant?
But tell me,” said Beauchamp, “what is life? Is it not a hall in Death’s anteroom?
Yes, indeed, I have often thought with a bitter joy that these riches, which would make the wealth of a dozen families, will be forever lost to those men who persecute me. This idea was one of vengeance to me, and I tasted it slowly in the night of my dungeon and the despair of my captivity.
Captain or mate, M. Morrel, I shall always have the greatest respect for those who possess the owners’ confidence.
I know that I have been a fool, a madman, to believe that the snow could have been animated, that the marble could grow warm; but what would you expect? The lover easily believes in love, nor has my journey been entirely in vain, since I behold you now.
No matter; God wants Man, whom he has created and in whose heart he has so profoundly entrenched a love for life, to do all he can to preserve an existence that is sometimes so painful, but always so dear to him.
Do not be deceived: I am suffering less, because I have less strength in me to suffer. At your age, you have faith in life; it is a privilege of youth to believe and to hope. But old men see death more clearly.
Follow me, then,” said the abbe, as he re-entered the subterranean passage, in which he soon disappeared, followed by Dantes.
D’Artagnan had time to reflect that women – those gentle doves – treat one another more cruelly than bears and tigers.
I have to admit,’ replied Villefort, looking at his father with astonishment, ‘you seem very well informed.’ ‘Heavens, it’s simple enough. You people, who hold power, have only what can be bought for money; we, who are waiting to gain power, have what is given out of devotion.’ ‘Devotion?’ Villefort laughed. ‘Yes, devotion. That is the honest way to describe ambition when it has expectations.
Son,’ Danglars replied.
There is a very profound axiom in law, which is consistent with what I told you a short time ago, and it is this: unless an evil thought is born in a twisted mind, human nature is repelled by crime. However, civilization has given us needs, vices and artificial appetites which sometimes cause us to repress our good instincts and lead us to wrongdoing.1 Hence the maxim: if you wish to find the guilty party, first discover whose interests the crime serves!
The belfry of St Cloud slowly emitted ten strokes from its broad sonorous jaws. There was something melancholy in that voice of bronze, which thus breathed its lamentations in the night. But each of those sounds, which told the hour he sighed for, vibrated harmoniously in the heart of the young man.
An all-wise Providence permits not sinners to escape thus easily from the punishment they have merited on earth, but reserves them to aid his own designs, using them as instruments whereby to work his vengeance on the guilty.
Here’s a man ready to chop another man’s self-esteem to pieces with an axe, yet he cries out in pain when his own is pricked with a needle.
However anxious one is to reach one’s goal, one can excuse delays on the route when these are caused by ovations.
I never will leave you, for I am sure I could not exist without you.
That man made a deep impression on me; I shall never forget his countenance!” The Englishman smiled imperceptibly.