Symmetry is tedious, and tedium is the very basis of mourning. Despair yawns.
God blesses man, not for having found but for having sought.
Progress is not accomplished in one stage.
The tomb is not a blind alley: it is a thoroughfare. It closes on the twilight. It opens on the dawn.
She had had sweet dreams, which possibly arose from the fact that her little bed was very white.
There is suffering in the light; in excess it burns. Flame is hostile to the wing. To burn and yet to fly, this is the miracle of genius.
Men are still men. The despot’s wickedness Comes of ill teaching, and of power’s excess, – Comes of the purple he from childhood wears, Slaves would be tyrants if the chance were theirs.
The truth of an upright man must be accepted on his own terms. Moreover, since natures vary, we must agree that all the beauties of human excellence may be fostered by faiths that we do not share.
I represent a party which does not yet exist: the party Revolution-Civilization. This party will make the twentieth century. There will issue from it first the United States of Europe, then the United States of the World.
Philosophy is the microscope of thought. Everything desires to flee from it, but nothing escapes it.
That is to be two and to be but one. A man and a woman mingled into one angel. It is heaven.
In every cradle decked with rosy wreath Lurk germs of death.
Enthusiasm is the fever of reason.
A man trying to escape never thinks himself sufficiently concealed.
Emotion is always new.
Dry happiness is like dry bread. We eat, but we do not dine. I wish for the superfluous, for the useless, for the extravagant, for the too much, for that which is not good for anything.
Have but luck, and you will have the rest; be fortunate, and you will be thought great.
God became man, granted. The devil became a woman.
To see so much misery everywhere, I suspect that God is not rich. He keeps up appearances, it is true, but I feel the pinch. He gives a revolution as a merchant, whose credit is low, gives a ball.
Idleness is a mother. She has a son, robbery, and a daughter, hunger.