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But Also Remember: If You Have Any Genuine Feelings, Hide Them Like Treasure; Never Let Anyone So Much As Suspect Them, Or You're Lost. Instead Of Being The Executioner, You'll Be The Victim. And If You Ever Fall In Love, Keep That Absolutely Secret! Never Breathe A Word Until You're Completely Sure Of The Person To Whom You Open Your Heart. And To Protect That Love, Even Before You Feel It, Learn To Despise The World.

-Honore De Balzac

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But Also Remember: If

Honore De Balzac

...

But Also Remember: If You Have Any Genuine Feelings, Hide Them Like Treasure; Never Let Anyone So Much As Suspect Them, Or You're Lost. Instead Of Being The Executioner, You'll Be The Victim. And If You Ever Fall In Love, Keep That Absolutely Secret! Never Breathe A Word Until You're Completely Sure Of The Person To Whom You Open Your Heart. And To Protect That Love, Even Before You Feel It, Learn To Despise The World.

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Falling In Love

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Squeeze Marriage As Much As You Like, You Will Never Extract Anything From It But Fun For Bachelors And Boredom For Husbands.

You May Imitate, But Never Counterfeit.

The Boor Covers Himself, The Rich Man Or The Fool Adorns Himself, And The Elegant Man Gets Dressed.

In Intimate Family Life, There Comes A Moment When Children, Willingly Or No, Become The Judges Of Their Parents.

Our Energies Are Often Stimulated By The Necessity Of Supporting A Being Weaker Than Ourselves.

The Events Of Human Life, Whether Public Or Private, Are So Intimately Linked To Architecture That Most Observers Can Reconstruct Nations Or Individuals In All The Truth Of Their Habits From The Remains Of Their Monuments Or From Their Domestic Relics.

The Weakest Being On Earth Can Accomplish Feats Of Strength. The Frailest Urchin Will Ring Every Doorbell On The Street In Arctic Weather Or Hoist Himself Aloft To Inscribe His Name On A Virgin Monument.

To Man, Faith; To Woman, Doubt. She Bears The Heavier Burden. Does Not Woman Invariably Suffer For Two?

Emulation Is Not Rivalry. Emulation Is The Child Of Ambition; Rivalry Is The Unlovable Daughter Of Envy.

Holding This Book In Your Hand, Sinking Back In Your Soft Armchair, You Will Say To Yourself: Perhaps It Will Amuse Me. And After You Have Read This Story Of Great Misfortunes, You Will No Doubt Dine Well, Blaming The Author For Your Own Insensitivity, Accusing Him Of Wild Exaggeration And Flights Of Fancy. But Rest Assured: This Tragedy Is Not A Fiction. All Is True.

The Fashions We Call English In Paris Are French In London, And Vice Versa. Franco-british Hostility Vanishes When It Comes To Questions Of Words And Clothing. God Save The King Is A Tune Composed By Lully For A Chorus In A Play By Racine.

Though The Human Heart May Have To Pause For Rest When Climbing The Heights Of Affection It Rarely Stops On The Slippery Slope Of Hatred.

How Did You Get Back?' Asked Vautrin. 'i Walked,' Replied Eugene. 'i Wouldn't Like Half-pleasures, Myself,' Observed The Tempter. 'i'd Want To Go There In My Own Carriage, Have My Own Box, And Come Back In Comfort. All Or Nothing, That's My Motto.' 'and A Very Good One,' Said Madame Vauquer.

This Surface Good-nature Which Captivates A New Acquaintance And Is No Bar To Treachery, Which Knows No Scruple And Is Never At Fault For An Excuse, Which Makes An Outcry At The Wound Which It Condones, Is One Of The Most Distinctive Features Of The Journalist. This Camaraderie (the Word Is A Stroke Of Genius) Corrodes The Noblest Minds; It Eats Into Their Pride Like Rust, Kills The Germ Of Great Deeds, And Lends A Sanction To Moral Cowardice.

But Also Remember: If You Have Any Genuine Feelings, Hide Them Like Treasure; Never Let Anyone So Much As Suspect Them, Or You're Lost. Instead Of Being The Executioner, You'll Be The Victim. And If You Ever Fall In Love, Keep That Absolutely Secret! Never Breathe A Word Until You're Completely Sure Of The Person To Whom You Open Your Heart. And To Protect That Love, Even Before You Feel It, Learn To Despise The World.

Falling In Love

The Life Of A Man Who Deliberately Runs Through His Fortune Often Becomes A Business Speculation; His Friends, His Pleasures, Patrons, And Acquaintances Are His Capital.

A Great Writer Is Nothing Less Than A Martyr Who Does Not Die.

To Lese-majeste And Contempt Of Court, We Must Add The Crime Of Lese-million, That Fearful Indignity We Visit On The Rich When We Expose The Impotence Of Gold.

Love Endows Us With A Sort Of Personal Religion; We Respect Another Live Within Ourselves.

Economized Love Is Never Real Love.

Children, Dear And Loving Children, Can Alone Console A Woman For The Loss Of Her Beauty.

A Girl's Coquetry Is Of The Simplest, She Thinks That All Is Said When The Veil Is Laid Aside; A Woman's Coquetry Is Endless, She Shrouds Herself In Veil After Veil, She Satisfies Every Demand Of Man's Vanity, The Novice Responds But To One.

There Are Two Histories : Official History, Lying, And Then Secret History, Where You Find The Real Causes Of Events.

Modern Reformers Offer Nebulous Theories Or Write Philanthropic Novels. But Your Thief Acts! He Is As Clear As A Fact And As Logical As A Punch On The Nose! And What A Style He Has!

Women See Everything Or Nothing According To The Inclination Of Their Hearts. Love Is Their Sole Light.

Jealousy, An Eminently Credulous And Suspicious Passion, Allows Fancy The Greatest Possible Play. But It Does Not Bestow Wit, It Banishes All Sense.

A Careful Observation Of Nature Will Disclose Pleasantries Of Superb Irony. She Has For Instance Placed Toads Close To Flowers.

She Who Is Really A Wife, One In Heart, Flesh, And Bone, Must Follow Wherever He Leads, In Whom Her Life, Her Strength, Her Pride, And Happiness Are Centered.

The Innocence Of Virgins Is Like Milk Which Turns When Exposed To A Clap Of Thunder, To A Tart Smell, To A Hot Day, To The Merest Nothing.

In The First Woman We Love, We Love Everything. Growing Older, We Love The Woman Only.

In The Medical Profession A Horse And Carriage Are More Necessary Than Any Scientific Knowledge.

For Passion, Be It Observed, Brings Insight With It; It Can Give A Sort Of Intelligence To Simpletons, Fools, And Idiots, Especially During Youth.

Any Man, However Blase Or Depraved, Finds His Love Kindled Anew When He Sees Himself Threatened By A Rival.

Old Men Are Prone To Invest The Futures Of Young Men With Their Own Past Sorrows.

Constancy Will Always Be The Genius Of Love, The Indication Of That Strength Which Constitutes The Poet. A Man Should Possess All Women In His Wife, Like Those Squalid Poetasters Of The Seventeenth Century Who Made Fair Irises And Dazzling Chloes Of Their Lowly Manons.

Innocence Alone Dares Commit Certain Acts Of Audacity. Virtue, When Tutored, Is As Calculating As Vice.

Man Is Neither Good Nor Bad; He Is Born With Instincts And Abilities.

First Love Is A Kind Of Vaccination Which Saves A Man From Catching The Complaint The Second Time.

To Have One's Mother-in-law In The Country When One Lives In Paris, And Vice Versa, Is One Of Those Strokes Of Luck That One Encounters Only Too Rarely.

I Believe In The Incomprehensibility Of God.

Memories Beautify Life, But The Capacity To Forget Makes It Bearable.

Remorse Is Impotent; It Will Repeat Its Faults. Repentance Only Is A True Force; It Puts An End To Everything.

A Lover Always Thinks Of His Mistress First And Himself Second; With A Husband It Runs The Other Way.

We Are Scarcely Apt To Berate The Source Of Enjoyment.

Power Does Not Consist In Striking With Force Or With Frequency, But In Striking True.

Virginity, Like All Monstrosities, Possesses Special Riches And Its Own Absorbing Grandeur. Among The Chaste, Life Forces Are Economized And Thus Gain In Resistance And Durability.

Everything Becomes Agitated. Ideas Quick-march Into Motion Like Battalions Of A Grand Army To Its Legendary Fighting Ground, And The Battle Rages. Memories Charge In, Bright Flags On High; The Cavalry Of Metaphor Deploys With A Magnificent Gallop; The Artillery Of Logic Rushes Up With Clattering Wagons And Cartridges; On Imagination's Orders, Sharpshooters Sight And Fire; Forms And Shapes And Characters Rear Up; The Paper Is Spread With Ink - For The Nightly Labor Begins And Ends With Torrents Of This Black Water, As A Battle Opens And Concludes With Black Powder.

Courtesy Is Only A Thin Veneer On The General Selfishness.

When We Drink Coffee, Ideas March In Like The Army

Doubt Follows White-winged Hope With Trembling Steps.

For Pain Is Perhaps But A Violent Pleasure? Who Could Determine The Point Where Pleasure Becomes Pain, Where Pain Is Still A Pleasure? Is Not The Utmost Brightness Of The Ideal World Soothing To Us, While The Lightest Shadows Of The Physical World Annoy?

What Makes Friendship Indissolute And What Doubles Its Charms Is A Feeling We Find Lacking In Love: I Mean Certitude.

A Woman In Love Has Full Intelligence Of Her Power; The More Virtuous She Is, The More Effective Her Coquetry.

Self-interest Is An Ineffable Feeling Which Shall Follow Us Into God's Very Presence Since They Say There Is A Hierarchy Even Among The Holy Saints.

For The Journalist, Anything Probable Is Gospel Truth.

Love Based Upon Money And Vanity Forms The Most Stubborn Of Passions.

God Is The Author, Men Are Only The Players. These Grand Pieces Which Are Played Upon Earth Have Been Composed In Heaven.

All Men Can Bear A Familiar, Definite Misfortune Better Than The Cruel Alternations Of A Fate Which, From One Moment To Another, Brings Excessive Joy Or Sorrow.

Man's Condition Is Horrible Because, No Matter What Form His Happiness May Take, It Arises From Some Species Of Ignorance.

Equality May Be The Law, But No Human Power Can Install It.

The Impossible Is Justified By The Fact That It Occurred

Neither The Passions Not Justice Nor Politics Nor The Great Social Forces Ever Consider The Victims They Strike.

Men Are Such Dupes By Choice, That He Who Would Impose Upon Others Never Need Be At A Loss To Find Ready Victims.

Manners Are The Hypocrisy Of A Nation.

The Human Heart May Find Here And There A Resting-place Short Of The Highest Height Of Affection, But We Seldom Stop In The Steep, Downward Slope Of Hatred.

It Is Easy To Sit Up And Take Notice, What Is Difficult Is Getting Up And Taking Action.

A Sacrament By Virtue Of Which Each Imparts Nothing But Vexations To The Other.

My Further Advice On Your Relations To Women Is Based Upon That Other Motto Of Chivalry, "serve All, Love One."

Great Love Affairs Start With Champagne And End With Tisane.

In A Husband, There Is Only A Man; In A Married Woman, There Is A Man, A Father, A Mother And A Woman.

Political Liberty, The Peace Of A Nation, And Science Itself Are Gifts For Which Fate Demands A Heavy Tax In Blood!

Happiness Lends Poetic Charms To Woman, And Dress Adorns Her Like A Delicate Tinge Of Rouge.

Modern Society Includes Three Types Of Men Who Can Never Think Very Highly Of The World--the Priest, The Physician, And The Attorney-at-law. They All Wear Black, Too, For Are They Not In Mourning For Every Virtue And Every Illusion?

Women, Perhaps Even Require A Little Hypocrisy.

True Love Rules Especially Through Memory.

A Woman's Greatest Charm Consists In A Constant Appeal To A Man's Generosity By A Gracious Declaration Of Helplessness Which Fills Him With Pride And Awakens The Most Magnificent Feelings In His Heart.

The Habits Of Every Animal Are, At Least In The Eyes Of Man, Constantly Similar In All Ages. But The Habits, The Clothes, The Words And The Dwelling Of A Prince, A Banker, An Artist, A Bourgeois, A Priest And A Pauper, Are Wholly Dissimilar And Change At The Will Of Civilizations.

Glory And Fame Mean Twelve Thousand Francs' Worth Of Paid Articles In The Newspapers And Five Thousand Crowns' Worth Of Dinners.

Towns Find It As Hard As Houses Of Business To Rise Again From Ruin.

Clouds Symbolize The Veils That Shroud God.

[raphael's] Great Superiority Is Due To The Instinctive Sense Which, In Him, Seems To Desire To Shatter Form. Form Is, In His Figures, What It Is In Ourselves, An Interpreter For The Communication Of Ideas And Sensations, An Exhaustless Source Of Poetic Inspiration. Every Figure Is A World In Itself, A Portrait Of Which The Original Appeared In A Sublime Vision, In A Flood Of Light, Pointed To By An Inward Voice, Laid Bare By A Divine Finger Which Showed What The Sources Of Expression Had Been In The Whole Past Life Of The Subject.

In All Lands, Sailors Form A Race Apart. They Profess A Congenital Contempt For Landlubbers. As For The Tradesman, He Understands Nothing Of Sailors Nor Cares A Fig About Them. He Is Content To Rob Them If He Can.

Despotism Accomplishes Great Things Illegally; Liberty Doesn't Even Go To The Trouble Of Accomplishing Small Things Legally.

Admiration Bestowed Upon Any One But Ourselves Is Always Tedious.

The Duration Of A Couple's Passion Is In Proportion To The Woman's Original Resistance Or To The Obstacles That Social Hazards Have Placed In The Way Of Her Happiness.

An Unfulfilled Vocation Drains The Color From A Man's Entire Existence.

When Will Conventional Good Manners Become Attractive? When Will Ladies Of Fashion Exhibit Their Shoulders A Little Less And Their Affability And Wit A Little More?

The Response Man Has The Greatest Difficulty In Tolerating Is Pity, Especially When He Warrants It. Hatred Is A Tonic, It Makes One Live, It Inspires Vengeance, But Pity Kills, It Makes Our Weakness Weaker.

To Promote Laughter Without Joining In It Greatly Heightens The Effect.

A Husband And Wife Who Have Separate Bedrooms Have Either Drifted Apart Or Found Happiness.

Found Happiness

There Is Neither Vice Nor Virtue, There Are Only Circumstances.

Your Women Of Fashion Ceases To Be A Woman. She Is Neither Mother, Nor Wife, Nor Lover. She Is, Medically Speaking, Sex On The Brain.

If We Study Nature Attentively In Its Great Evolutions As In Its Minutest Works, We Cannot Fail To Recognize The Possibility Of Enchantment - Giving To That Word Its Exact Significance.

From The Manner In Which A Woman Draws Her Thread At Every Stitch Of Her Needlework, Any Other Woman Can Surmise Her Thoughts.

Marriage Is A Fierce Battle Before Which The Two Partners Ask Heaven For Its Blessing, Because Loving Each Other Is The Most Audacious Of Enterprises; The Battle Is Not Slow To Start, And Victory, That Is To Say Freedom, Goes To The Cleverest.

Law Is A Silvery Web That Lets The Big Flies Pass And Catches All The Small Ones.

A Husband Can Commit No Greater Blunder Than To Discuss His Wife, If She Is Virtuous, With His Mistress; Unless It Be To Mention His Mistress, If She Is Beautiful, To His Wife.

Sometimes At The Best Moments A Single Word Or A Look Is Enough.'

Only When One Has Learned To Acknowledge That Wiser Minds Have Made Better Words To Come Out Of Our Mouths May We Truly, Then, Begin To Speak Them.

Too Great A Display Of Delicacy Can And Does Sometimes Infringe Upon De-cency.

A Vocation Is Born To Us All; Happily Most Of Us Meet Promptly Our Twin,--occupation.

All Human Beings Go Through A Previous Life... Who Knows How Many Fleshly Forms The Heir Of Heaven Occupies Before He Can Be Brought To Understand The Value Of That Silence And Solitude Of Spiritual Worlds?

What A Thing Of Fantasy A Woman May Become After Dusk.

It Is Only In The Act Of Nursing That A Woman Realizes Her Motherhood In Visible And Tangible Fashion; It Is A Joy Of Every Moment.

Whereas Scoundrels Become Reconciled After Knifing One Another, Lovers Break Up Irrevocably Over A Mere Glance Or Word.

A Courage Which Looks Easy & Yet Is Rare; The Courage Of A Teacher Repeating Day After Day The Same Lessons - The Least Rewarded Of All Forms Of Courage.

As Soon As Man Seeks To Penetrate The Secrets Of Nature--in Which Nothing Is Secret And It Is But A Question Of Seeing--he Realizes That The Simple Produces The Supernatural.

To Live In The Presence Of Great Truths And Eternal Laws, To Be Led By Permanent Ideals - That Is What Keeps A Man Patient When The World Ignores Him, And Calm And Unspoiled When The World Praises Him.

Intuition, Like The Rays Of The Sun, Acts Only In An Inflexibly Straight Line; It Can Guess Right Only On Condition Of Never Diverting Its Gaze; The Freaks Of Chance Disturb It.

When Religion And Royalty Are Swept Away, The People Will Attack The Great, And After The Great, They Will Fall Upon The Rich.

The Secret Of Great Fortunes Without Apparent Cause Is A Crime Forgotten, Forgotten Because It Was Properly Done.

Poverty Is A Divine Stepmother Who Does For Youths What Their Own Mothers Were Unable To Do. It Introduces Them To Frugality, To The World And To Life.

With Monuments As With Men, Position Means Everything.

Love Is Not Only A Feeling, It Is Also An Art. A Simple Word, A Sensitive Precaution, A Mere Nothing Reveal To A Woman The Sublime Artist Who Can Touch Her Heart Without Withering It.

Where Poverty Ceases, Avarice Begins.

A Man Is A Poor Creature Compared To A Woman.

Power Is Not Revealed By Striking Hard Or Often, But By Striking True.

Rare Is The Man Who Suffers No Remorse As He Passes From The State Of Confidant To That Of Rival.

Man Judges Of Nature In Relation To Itself; The Angelic Spirit Judges Of It In Relation To Heaven. In Short, To The Spirits Everything Speaks.

In Family Life People Almost Always Adjust Themselves To Misfortune. They Make A Bed Of It And Hope Makes Them Accept That Bed, However Hard It Is.

A Woman In The Depths Of Despair Proves So Persuasive That She Wrenches The Forgiveness Lurking Deep In The Heart Of Her Lover. This Is All The More True When That Woman Is Young, Pretty, And So Decollete As To Emerge From The Neck Of Her Gown In The Costume Of Eve.

Love Has Its Own Instinct, Finding The Way To The Heart, As The Feeblest Insect Finds The Way To Its Flower, With A Will Which Nothing Can Dismay Nor Turn Aside.

Unintelligent Persons Are Like Weeds That Thrive In Good Ground; They Love To Be Amused In Proportion To The Degree In Which They Weary Themselves.

One Admirable Trait In Women Is Their Lack Of Illusions About Themselves. They Never Reason About Their Most Blameworthy Actions; Their Feelings Carry Them Away. Even Their Dissimulation Comes Naturally To Them, And In Them Crime Is Free Of All Baseness. Most Of The Time They Simply Do Not Know How It Happened.

Everything Is Bilateral In The Domain Of Thought. Ideas Are Binary. Janus Is The Myth Of Criticism And The Symbol Of Genius. Only God Is Triangular!

A Year At The Breast Is Quite Enough; Children Who Are Suckled Longer Are Said To Grow Stupid, And I Am All For Popular Sayings.

Events Are Never Absolute, Their Outcome Depends Entirely Upon The Individual. Misfortune Is A Stepping Stone For A Genius, A Piscina For A Christian, A Treasure For A Man Of Parts, And An Abyss For A Weakling.

Behind Every Fortune There Is A Crime.

The Errors Of Women Spring, Almost Always, From Their Faith In The Good, Or Their Confidence In The True

A Great Love Is A Credit Opened In Favor Of A Power So Consuming That The Moment Of Bankruptcy Must Inevitably Occur.

And He, Like Many Jaded People, Had Few Pleasures Left In Life Save Good Food And Drink.

Good Befalls Us While We Sleep, Sometimes.

The Mind, Too, Has Its Regimen. It Needs Gymnastics, Just Like The Body Does.

At Thirty Years A Woman Asks Her Lover To Give Her Back The Esteem She Has Forfeited For His Sake; She Lives Only For Him, Her Thoughts Are Full Of His Future, He Must Have A Great Career, She Bids Him Make It Glorious; She Can Obey, Entreat, Command, Humble Herself, Or Rise In Pride; Times Without Number She Brings Comfort When A Young Girl Can Only Make Moan.

Six Weeks With A Fever Is An Eternity.

Death Unites As Well As Separates; It Silences All Paltry Feeling.

There Are Words Which Cut Like Steel.

If Youth Were Not Ignorant And Timid, Civilization Would Be Impossible.

One Should Believe In Marriage As In The Immortality Of The Soul.

We Do Not Attach Ourselves Lastingly To Anything That Has Not Cost Us Care, Labor Or Longing.

Grief Ennobles The Commonest People Because It Has Its Own Essential Grandeur. To Shine With The Luster Of Grief, A Person Need Only Be Sincere.

In A World Of Hunchbacks, A Fine Figure Becomes A Monstrosity.

You Cannot Pluck Love Out Of Your Heart As You Would Pull A Tooth.

Virtue, My Pet, Is An Abstract Idea, Varying In Its Manifestations With The Surroundings. Virtue In Provence, In Constantinople, In London, And In Paris Bears Very Different Fruit, But Is None The Less Virtue.

A Sick Man, Surrounded By Those Who Love Him, Nursed By Those Who Wish Earnestly That He Should Live, Will Recover (all Other Things Being Equal), When Another Patient Tended By Hirelings Will Die. Doctors Decline To See Unconscious Magnestism In This Phenomenon; For Them It Is The Result Of Intelligent Nursing, Of Exact Obedience To Their Orders; But Many A Mother Knows The Virtue Of Such Ardent Projections Of Strong, Unceasing Prayer.

We Exaggerate Misfortune And Happiness Alike. We Are Never As Bad Off Or As Happy As We Say We Are.

Exaggeration Is

Old Maids, Having Never Bent Their Temper Or Their Lives To Other Lives And Other Tempers, As Woman's Destiny Requires, Have For The Most Part A Mania For Making Everything About Them Bend To Them.

Love Is The Reduction Of The Universe To The Single Being, And The Expansion Of A Single Being, Even To God

A Woman Must Be A Genius To Create A Good Husband.

Women, When They Have Made A Sheep Of A Man, Always Tell Him That He Is A Lion With A Will Of Iron.

The Wounds Of Self-love Turn Incurable When The Oxide Of Self-love Gets Into Them.

It's Catastrophies Which Turn Wise And Strong People Into Philosophers.

Love May Be Or It May Not, But Where It Is, It Ought To Reveal Itself In Its Immensity.

Give To A Wounded Heart Seclusion; Consolation Nor Reason Ever Effected Anything In Such A Case.

How Natural It Is To Destroy What We Cannot Possess, To Deny What We Do Not Understand, And To Insult What We Envy!

Nothing Is So Discreet As A Young Face, For Nothing Is Less Mobile; It Has The Serenity, The Surface Smoothness, And The Freshnessof A Lake. There Is No Character In Women's Faces Before The Age Of Thirty.

Love Is Like Some Fresh Spring, First A Stream And Then A River, Changing Its Aspect And Its Nature As It Flows To Plunge Itself In Some Boundless Ocean, Where Restricted Natures Only Find Monotony, But Where Great Souls Are Engulfed In Endless Contemplation.

All Genuinely Noble Women Prefer Truth To Falsehood. As The Russians With Their Czar, They Are Unwilling To See Their Idol Degraded; They Want To Be Proud Of The Domination They Accept.

Marriage Is A Fight To The Death. Before Contracting It, The Two Parties Concerned Implore The Benediction Of Heaven Because To Promise To Love Each Other Forever Is The Rashest Of Enterprises.

The Key To All Sciences Is Unquestionably The Question Mark. To The Word How? We Owe Most Of Our Greatest Discoveries. Wisdom In Life May Perhaps Consist In Asking Ourselves On All Occasions: Why?

Journalists Grow Accustomed To Seeing Evil And They Let It Pass; They Proceed To Approve It, And They End By Committing It Themselves.

It Is Beyond A Doubt That During The Sixteenth Century, And The Years Immediately Preceding And Following It, Poisoning Had Been Brought To A Pitch Of Perfection Which Remains Unknown To Modern Chemistry, But Which Is Indisputably Proved By History. Italy, The Cradle Of Modern Science, Was At That Time, The Inventor And Mistress Of These Secrets, Many Of Which Are Lost.

No Hawk Swooping Down Upon His Prey, No Stag Improvising New Detours By Which To Trick The Huntsman, No Dog Scenting Game From Afar Is Comparable In Speed To The Celerity Of A Salesman When He Gets Wind A Deal, To His Skill In Tripping Up Or Forestalling A Rival, And To The Art With Which He Sniffs Out And Discovers A Possible Sale.

A Mother's Happiness Is Like A Beacon, Lighting Up The Future But Reflected Also On The Past In The Guise Of Fond Memories.

I Do Not Regard A Broker As A Member Of The Human Race.

What Is Motherhood Save Nature In Her Most Gladsome Mood?

People Who Climb From One Rung Of Society To Another Can Never Do Anything Simply.

People Who Are In Love Suspect Nothing Or Everything.

Glory Is A Poison, Good To Be Taken In Small Doses.

When Women Love, They Forgive Everything...

The Endless Legacy Of The Past To The Present Is The Secret Source Of Human Genius.

Bankers Are Lynxes. To Expect Any Gratitude From Them Is Equivalent To Attempting To Move The Wolves Of The Ukraine To Pity In The Middle Of Winter.

One Of The Most Detestable Habits Of Lilliputian Minds Is To Find Their Own Littleness In Others.

During The Great Storms Of Our Lives We Imitate Those Captains Who Jettison Their Weightiest Cargo.

The Art Of Motherhood Involves Much Silent, Unobtrusive Self-denial, An Hourly Devotion Which Finds No Detail Too Minute.

A Grocer Is Attracted To His Business By A Magnetic Force As Great As The Repulsion Which Renders It Odious To Artists.

Like Most Young People, These Two Attributed To The World Their Own Intelligence And Virtues. Youth Who Knows No Failure Has No Mercy On The Faults Of Other People; But It Has Also A Sublime Faith In Them.

Necessity Is Often The Spur To Genius.

They [twin Beds] Are The Most Stupid, The Most Perfidious, And The Most Dangerous Invention In The World. Shame And A Curse On Who Thought Of Them.

It Is Not Hope But Despair That Gives Us The Measure Of Our Ambitions. We May Yield Secretly To Beautiful Poems Of Hope But Grief Looms Start And Stripped Of All Veils.

I Declare, On My Soul And Conscience, That The Attainment Of Power, Or Of A Great Name In Literature, Seemed To Me An Easier Victory Than A Success With Some Young, Witty, And Gracious Lady Of High Degree.

Loyalty In Time Of Need Is Possibly One Of The Noblest Of Victories A Courtier Can Win Over Himself.

Clothes Are Like A Gloss That Sets Off Everything; Dresser Were Invented More To Enhance Physical Advantages Than To Veil Physical Defects.

It's Not Enough To Be A Good Person. You Also Have To Show It.

Noble Passions Are Like Vices: The More They Are Satisfied, The Greater They Grow, Mothers And Gamblers Are Insatiable.

I Prefer Thought To Action, An Idea To A Transaction, Contemplation To Activity.

A Creole Woman Is Like A Child, She Wants To Possess Everything Immediately; Like A Child, She Would Set Fire To A House In Order To Fry An Egg. In Her Languor, She Thinks Of Nothing; When Passionately Aroused, She Thinks Of Any Act Possible Or Impossible.

Is There Any Instinct More Deeply Implanted In The Heart Of Man Than The Pride Of Protection, A Protection Which Is Constantly Exerted For A Fragile And Defenceless Creature?

The Country Is Provincial; It Becomes Ridiculous When It Tries To Ape Paris.

One Can Imagine The Look The Two Lovers Exchanged; It Was Like A Flame, For Virtuous Lovers Have Not A Shred Of Hypocrisy.

There Is Something Great And Terrible About Suicide.

Creole Women Take After Europe In Their Intelligence, After The Tropics In The Illogical Violence Of Their Passions, And After The Indies In The Apathetic Indolence With Which They Commit Or Suffer Good And Evil.

As Soon As Coffee Is In Your Stomach, There Is A General Commotion. Ideas Begin To Move…similes Arise, The Paper Is Covered. Coffee Is Your Ally And Writing Ceases To Be A Struggle.

In Painting, You Can Suddenly Come Upon Something So Huge That No-one Can Deal With It.

It Is Always Assumed By The Empty-headed, Who Chatter About Themselves For Want Of Something Better, That People Who Do Not Discuss Their Affairs Openly Must Have Something To Hide.

Most Women Wish To Feel That Their Spirit Has Been Violated. Do They Not, Indeed, Flatter Themselves On Never Yielding Save To Force?

To Get A Traveling Salesman Drunk Is The Height Of Impossibility.

Nature Endows Woman Alternately With A Particular Strength Which Helps Her To Suffer And A Weakness Which Counsels Her To Be Resigned.

Discouragement Is Of All Ages: In Youth It Is A Presentiment, In Old Age A Remembrance.

Love Is Precisely To The Moral Nature What The Sun Is To The Earth.

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