The idea which man forms of beauty imprints itself throughout his attire, rumples or stiffens his garments, rounds off or aligns his gestures, and, finally, even subtly penetrates the features of his face.
It is this admirable and immortal instinct for beauty which causes us to regard the earth and its spectacles as a glimpse, a correspondence of the beyond.
It is regrettable that, among the Rights of Man, the right of contradicting oneself has been forgotten.
A work of art should be like a well-planned crime.
I am the vampire at my own veins.
Torture, as the art of discovering the truth, is barbaric nonsense; it is the application of a material means to a spiritual end.
Woman is natural, that is to say, abominable.
There are some temptations which are so strong that they must be virtues.
I think I would be happy in that place I happen not to be, and this question of moving house is the subject of a perpetual dialogue I have with my soul.
Perfumes, colours and sounds echo one another.
A child sees everything in a sense of newness – he is always drunk. Genius is nothing but childhood re-attained at will.
What a mysterious faculty is that queen of the faculties!
Love is the natural occupation of the man of leisure.
Love is a taste for prostitution. In fact, there is no noble pleasure that cannot be reduced to Prostitution.
Multitude, solitude: equal and interchangeable terms for the active and prolific poet.
The dandy should aspire to be uninterruptedly sublime. He should live and sleep in front of a mirror.
Le mal se fait sans effort, naturellement, par fatalite ; le bien est toujours le produit d’un art. Evil is done without effort, naturally, it’s destiny; good is always a product of art.
Comme l’imagination a cre e le monde, elle le gouverne. Because imagination created the world, it governs it.
J’ai plus de souvenirs que si j’avais mille ans. IhavemorememoriesthanifIwereonethousandyearsold.
La’, tout n’est qu’ordre et beaute, Luxe, calme et volupte. There where all is order and beauty. Lush, calm and voluptuous.