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He Is The Best Gentleman That Is The Son Of His Own Deserts, And Not The Degenerated Heir Of Another's Virtue.

-Victor Hugo

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He Is The Best

Victor Hugo

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He Is The Best Gentleman That Is The Son Of His Own Deserts, And Not The Degenerated Heir Of Another's Virtue.

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M. Myriel Had To Undergo The Fate Of Every Newcomer In A Little Town, Where There Are Many Mouths Which Talk, And Very Few Heads Which Think.

We Are All Under Sentence Of Death, But With A Sort Of Indefinite Reprieve.

Every Good Quality Runs Into A Defect; Economy Borders On Avarice, The Generous Are Not Far From The Prodigal, The Brave Man Is Close To The Bully; He Who Is Very Pious Is Slightly Sanctimonious; There Are Just As Many Vices To Virtue As There Are Holes In The Mantle Of Diogenes.

What A Grand Thing, To Be Loved! What A Grander Thing Still, To Love!

The Sewer Is The Conscience Of The City.

No Army Can Withstand The Strength Of An Idea Whose Time Has Come.

There Is One Thing Stronger Than All The Armies In The World, And That Is An Idea Whose Time As Come.

The Heart Becomes Heroic Through Passion. It Is No Longer Composed Of Anything But What Is Pure; It No Longer Rests Upon Anything But What Is Elevated And Great.

For True Poetry, Complete Poetry, Consists In The Harmony Of Contraries. Hence, It Is Time To Say Aloud--and It Is Here Above Allthat Exceptions Prove The Rule--that Everything That Exists In Nature Exists In Art.

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.

Winter Is On My Head, But Eternal Spring Is In My Heart. The Nearer I Approach The End, The Plainer I Hear Around Me The Immortal Symphonies Of The Worlds Which Invite Me. . . . For Half A Century I Have Been Writing Thoughts In Prose, Verse, History, Drama, Romance, Tradition, Satire, Ode, And Song. I Have Tried Them All, But I Feel I Have Not Said A Thousandth Part Of That Which Is Within Me. When I Go Down To The Grave, I Can Say "i Have Finished My Day's Work," But I Cannot Say "i Have Finished My Life's Work."

Love Partakes Of The Soul Itself. It Is Of The Same Nature. Like It, It Is A Divine Spark, Like It, It Is Incorruptible, Indivisible, Imperishable, It Is The Point Of Fire Which Is Within Us, Which Is Immortal And Infinite, Which Nothing Can Limit And Nothing Can Extinguish.

Taste Is The Common Sense Of Genius.

The Omnipotence Of Evil Has Never Resulted In Anything But Fruitless Efforts. Our Thoughts Always Escape From Whoever Tries To Smother Them.

...though We Chisel Away As Best We Can At The Mysterious Block From Which Our Life Is Made, The Black Vein Of Destiny Continually Reappears.

Superstitions, Bigotries, Hypocrisies, Prejudices, These Phantoms, Phantoms Though They Be, Cling To Life; They Have Teeth And Nails In Their Shadowy Substance, And We Must Grapple With Them Individually And Make War On Them Without Truce; For It Is One Of Humanity's Inevitabilities To Be Condemned To Eternal Struggle With Phantoms.

Because A Fact Seems Strange To You, You Conclude That It Is Not One. ... All Science, However, Commences By Being Strange. Science Is Successive. It Goes From One Wonder To Another. It Mounts By A Ladder. The Science Of To-day Would Seem Extravagant To The Science Of A Former Time. Ptolemy Would Believe Newton Mad.

The Rich's Paradise Was Created By The Poor's Hell.

Press On! A Better Fate Awaits Thee.

If Nobody Loved, The Sun Would Go Out.

Friendship Exists Outside Our Modern Economy Of Scarcity... It's Not About Apportioning Vanishing Resources Of Time And Energy. Friendship Is A Blessed Relic Of The Ancient Economy Of The Gift, And The Time Freely Given To People Dear To You Actually Creates Magical Abundance.

If I Speak, I Am Condemned. If I Stay Silent, I Am Damned!

To Love Or Have Loved Is All-sufficing. We Must Not Ask For More. No Other Pearl Is To Be Found In The Shadowfolds Of Life. To Love Is An Accomplishment.

He Had, They Said, Tasted In Succession All The Apples Of The Tree Of Knowledge, And, Whether From Hunger Or Disgust, Had Ended By Tasting The Forbidden Fruit.

The Wise Man Is He Who Knows When And How To Stop

I Met In The Street A Very Poor Young Man Who Was In Love. His Hat Was Old, His Coat Worn, His Cloak Was Out At The Elbows, The Water Passed Through His Shoes, - And The Stars Through His Soul.

There Is No Rapture In The Love Which Is Prompted By Esteem; Such Affection Is Lasting, Not Passionate.

Let Us Have Compassion For Those Under Chastisement. Alas, Who Are We Ourselves? Who Am I And Who Are You? Whence Do We Come And Is It Quite Certain That We Did Nothing Before We Were Born? This Earth Is Not Without Some Resemblance To A Gaol. Who Knows But That Man Is A Victim Of Divine Justice? Look Closely At Life. It Is So Constituted That One Senses Punishment Everywhere.

He Caught Her, She Fell, He Caught Her In His Arms, He Held Her Tightly Unconscious Of What He Was Doing. He Held Her Up, Though Tottering Himself. He Felt As If His Head Were Filled With Smoke; Flashes Of Light Slipped Through His Eyelids; His Thoughts Vanished; It Seemed To Him That He Was Performing A Religious Act, And That He Was Committing A Profanation. Moreover, He Did Not Feel One Passionate Desire For This Ravishing Woman, Whose Form He Felt Against His Heart. He Was Lost In Love.

I'd Rather Be Hissed At For A Good Verse, Than Applauded For A Bad One.

When Love Has Fused And Mingled Two Beings In A Sacred And Angelic Unity, The Secret Of Life Has Been Discovered So Far As They Are Concerned; They Are No Longer Anything More Than The Two Boundaries Of The Same Destiny; They Are No Longer Anything But The Two Wings Of The Same Spirit. Love, Soar.

Diamonds Are Found Only In The Dark Places Of The Earth, Truths Are Found Only In The Depths Of Thought.

Many Great Actions Are Committed In Small Struggles.

The Soul Has Illusions As The Bird Has Wings: It Is Supported By Them.

In The Relations Of Man With The Animals, With The Flowers, With All The Objects Of Creation, There Is A Whole Great Ethic, Scarcely Perceived As Yet, Which Will At Length Break Through Into The Light, And Which Will Be The Corollary And The Complement To Human Ethics.

To Know How To Distinguish The Agitation Arising From Covetousness, From The Agitation Arising From Principles, To Fight The One And Aid The Other, In This Lies The Genius And The Power Of Great Revolutionary Leaders.

Revolutionary Leaders

People Do Not Read Stupidities With Impunity.

Those Who Pray Always Are Necessary To Those Who Never Pray. In Our View, The Whole Question Is In The Amount Of Thought That Is Mingled With Prayer.

Man's Greatest Actions Are Performed In Minor Struggles. Life, Misfortune, Isolation, Abandonment And Poverty Are Battlefields Which Have Their Heroes - Obscure Heroes Who Are At Times Greater Than Illustrious Heroes.

Gavroche Had Fallen Only To Rise Again; He Sat Up, A Long Stream Of Blood Rolled Down His Face, He Raised Both Arms In Air, Looked In The Direction Whence The Shot Came, And Began To Sing.

Love Has No Middle Term; Either It Destroys, Or It Saves. All Human Destiny Is This Dilemma. This Dilemma, Destruction Or Salvation, No Fate Proposes More Inexorably Than Love. Love Is Life, If It Is Not Death. Cradle; Coffin, Too. The Same Sentiment Says Yes And No In The Human Heart. Of All The Things God Has Made, The Human Heart Is The One That Sheds Most Light, And Alas! Most Night.

...man Lives By Affirmation Even More Than He Does By Bread.

Whatever Causes Night In Our Souls May Leave Stars.

Mirrors, Those Revealers Of The Truth, Are Hated; That Does Not Prevent Them From Being Of Use.

And Do You Know Monsieur Marius? I Believe I Was A Little In Love With You.

Dear God! How Beauty Varies In Nature And Art. In A Woman The Flesh Must Be Like Marble; In A Statue The Marble Must Be Like Flesh.

Melancholy Is The Happiness Of Being Sad.

Pleasure And Happiness

Now, One Cannot Read Nonsense With Impunity.

Men Like Me Are Impossible Until The Day When They Become Necessary.

Loving Is Almost A Substitute For Thinking. Love Is A Burning Forgetfulness Of All Other Things. How Shall We Ask Passion To Be Logical?

You Say, "where Goest Thou?" I Cannot Tell, And Still Go On. But If The Way Be Straight I Cannot Go Amiss: Before Me Lies Dawn And The Day: The Night Behind Me: That Suffices Me: I Break The Bounds: I See, And Nothing More; Believe And Nothing Less. My Future Is Not One Of My Concerns.

As A Means Of Contrast With The Sublime, The Grotesque Is, In Our View, The Richest Source That Nature Can Offer.

I'd Like A Drink. I Desire To Forget Life. Life Is A Hideous Invention By Somebody I Don't Know. It Doesn't Last, And It's Good For Nothing. You Break Your Neck Simply Living.

The Author Creates A Book And The People Accept Or Not Accept It. The Creator Of A Book Is An Author And The Creator Of It`s Fate Are People.

At Least You Are Mine! Soon – In A Few Months, Perhaps, My Angel Will Sleep In My Arms, Will Awaken In My Arms, Will Live There. All Your Thought At All Moments, All Your Looks Will Be For Me; All My Thought, All My Moments, All My Looks Will Be For You!

When A Man Is Out Of Sight, It Is Not Too Long Before He Is Out Of Mind.

I Was Always A Lover Of Soft-winged Things.

While Contemplating The Bride, And Eyeing The Cake Of Soap, He Muttered Between His Teeth: 'tuesday. It Was Not Tuesday. Was It Tuesday? Perhaps It Was Tuesday. Yes, It Was Tuesday.' No One Has Ever Discovered To What This Monologue Referred. Yes, Perchance, This Monologue Had Some Connection With The Last Occasion On Which He Had Dined, Three Days Before, For It Was Now Friday.

The Repose Of Darkness Is Deeper On The Water Than On The Land.

To Know, To Think, To Dream. That Is Everything.

Society Is A Republic. When An Individual Tries To Lift Themselves Above Others, They Are Dragged Down By The Mass, Either By Ridicule Or Slander.

God Secludes Himself; But The Thinker Listens At The Door.

Promise To Give Me A Kiss On My Brow When I Am Dead.--i Shall Feel It.

Rhyme, That Enslaved Queen, That Supreme Charm Of Our Poetry, That Creator Of Our Meter.

A Bird Sings, A Child Prattles, But It Is The Same Hymn; Hymn Indistinct, Inarticulate, But Full Of Profound Meaning.

If It Were (is It Not) Outrageous That Society Should Treat With Such Rigid Precision Those Of Its Members Who Were Most Poorly Endowed In The Distribution Or Wealth That Chance Had Made, And Who Were, Therefore, Most Worthy Of Indulgence.

She Might Have Melted A Heart Of Stone, But Nothing Can Melt A Heart Of Wood.

This First Glance Of A Soul Which Does Not Yet Know Itself Is Like Dawn In The Heavens; It Is The Awakening Of Something Radiant And Unknown.

No One Ever Keeps A Secret So Well As A Child.

Keeping Secrets

What Would Be Ugly In A Garden Constitutes Beauty In A Mountain.

Cheerfulness Is Like Money Well Expended In Charity; The More We Dispense Of It, The Greater Our Possession.

God Made The Water But Men Made The Wine.

To A Gargoyle On The Ramparts Of Notre Dame As Esmeralda Rides Off With Gringoire Quasimodo Says. "why Was I Not Made Of Stone Like Thee?

Whatever Causes Night In Our Souls May Leave Stars. Cimourdain Was Full Of Virtues And Truth, But They Shine Out Of A Dark Background.

We Teachers Make The Road, Others Will Make The Journey.

A Phenomenon Often Seen. A Sceptic Adhering To A Believer; That Is As Simple As The Law Of The Complementary Colours. What We Lack Attracts Us. Nobody Loves The Light Like The Blind Man.

Whenever We Encounter The Infinite In Man, However Imperfectly Understood, We Treat It With Respect. Whether In The Synagogue, The Mosque, The Pagoda, Or The Wigwam, There Is A Hideous Aspect Which We Execrate And A Sublime Aspect Which We Venerate. So Great A Subject For Spiritual Contemplation, Such Measureless Dreaming - The Echo Of God On The Human Wall!

Nothing Can Be Sadder Or More Profound Than To See A Thousand Things For The First And Last Time. To Journey Is To Be Born And Die Each Minute...all The Elements Of Life Are In Constant Flight From Us, With Darkness And Clarity Intermingled, The Vision And The Eclipse; We Look And Hasten, Reaching Out Our Hands To Clutch; Every Happening Is A Bend In The Road...and Suddenly We Have Grown Old. We Have A Sense Of Shock And Gathering Darkness; Ahead Is A Black Doorway; The Life That Bore Us Is A Flagging Horse, And A Veiled Stranger Is Waiting In The Shadows To Unharness Us.

England Has Two Books, The Bible And Shakespeare. England Made Shakespeare,but The Bible Made England.

Nothing Is Really Small; Whoever Is Open To The Deep Penetration Of Nature Knows This.

O Darkness, The Sky Is A Gloomy Precinct Whose Door You Close, And Whose Key The Soul Owns; And Night Divides Itself In Half, Being Diabolical And Holy, Between Ilis, The Black Angel, And Christ, The Starry Human Being.

Winter Is On My Head, But Eternal Spring Is In My Heart; I Breathe At This Hour The Fragrance Of The Lilacs, The Violets, And The Roses, As At Twenty Years Ago.

By Putting Forward The Hands Of The Clock You Shall Not Advance The Hour.

It Is Ourselves We Have To Fear. Prejudice Is The Real Robber, And Vice The Real Murderer.

The Mind's Eye Can Nowhere Find Anything More Dazzling Or More Dark Than In Man; It Can Fix Itself Upon Nothing Which Is More Awful, More Complex, More Mysterious, Or More Infinite. There Is One Spectacle Grander Than The Sea, That Is The Sky; There Is One Spectacle Grander Than The Sky, That Is The Interior Of The Soul.

Promise To Give Me A Kiss On My Brow When I Am Dead. --i Shall Feel It." She Dropped Her Head Again On Marius' Knees, And Her Eyelids Closed. He Thought The Poor Soul Had Departed. Eponine Remained Motionless. All At Once, At The Very Moment When Marius Fancied Her Asleep Forever, She Slowly Opened Her Eyes In Which Appeared The Sombre Profundity Of Death, And Said To Him In A Tone Whose Sweetness Seemed Already To Proceed From Another World:-- "and By The Way, Monsieur Marius, I Believe That I Was A Little Bit In Love With You.

Her Soul Trembled On Her Lips Like A Drop Of Dew On A Flower.

A Benevolent Malefactor, Merciful, Gentle, Helpful, Clement, A Convict, Returning Good For Evil, Giving Back Pardon For Hatred, Preferring Pity To Vengeance, Preferring To Ruin Himself Rather Than To Ruin His Enemy, Saving Him Who Had Smitten Him, Kneeling On The Heights Of Virtue, More Nearly Akin To An Angel Than To A Man. Javert Was Constrained To Admit To Himself That This Monster Existed. Things Could Not Go On In This Manner.

A Fixed Idea Ends In Madness Or Heroism.

Science Says The First Word On Everything, And The Last Word On Nothing.

Teach The Ignorant As Much As You Can; Society Is Culpable In Not Providing A Free Education For All And It Must Answer For The Night Which It Produces. If The Soul Is Left In Darkness Sins Will Be Committed. The Guilty One Is Not He Who Commits The Sin, But He Who Causes The Darkness.

Need Is A Low Door Which, When We Must By Stern Necessity Pass Through, Forces The Greatest To Bend Down The Most.

Equality Does Not Mean That All Plants Must Grow To The Same Height - A Society Of Tall Grass And Dwarf Trees, A Jostle Of Conflicting Jealousies. It Means, In Civic Terms, An Equal Outlet For All Talents; In Political Terms, That All Votes Will Carry The Same Weight; And In Religious Terms That All Beliefs Will Enjoy Equal Rights.

Often When We Think We Are Knotting One Thread, We Are Tying Quite Another.

The Wise Man Does Not Grow Old, But Ripens.

Love Is Reducing The Universe To One Being.

A Writer Is A World Trapped In A Person.

Table Talk And Lovers' Talk Equally Elude The Grasp; Lovers' Talk Is Clouds, Table Talk Is Smoke.

In Short, I Am Doing What I Can, I Suffer With The Same Universal Suffering, And I Try To Assuage It, I Possess Only The Puny Forces Of A Man, And I Cry To All: “help Me!

For The Rest, He Was The Same To All Men, The Fashionable World And The Ordinary People. He Judged Nothing In Haste, Or Without Taking Account Of The Cirumstances. He Said, 'let Me See How The Fault Arose.

No Man Is More Unhappy Than The One Who Is Never In Adversity; The Greatest Affliction Of Life Is Never To Be Afflicted.

In 1815, M. Charles Francois-bienvenu Myriel Was Bishop Of D-----. He Was A Man Of Seventy-five, And Had Occupied The Bishopric Of D----- Since 1806. Although It In No Manner Concerns, Even In The Remotest Degree, What We Have To Relate, It May Not Be Useless, Were It Only For The Sake Of Exactness In All Things, To Notice Here The Reports And Gossip Which Had Arisen On His Account From The Time Of His Arrival In The Diocese.

The Guilty One Is Not He Who Commits The Sin, But He Who Causes The Darkness.

God Blesses Man, Not For Having Found But For Having Sought.

First Problem. To Produce Wealth. Second Problem. To Distribute It.

He, Who Every Morning Plans The Transactions Of The Day, And Follows That Plan, Carries A Thread That Will Guide Him Through A Labyrinth Of The Most Busy Life.

In This Way, His Unhappy Soul Struggled With Its Anguish. Eighteen Hundred Years Before This Unfortunate Man, The Mysterious Being, In Whom All The Sanctities And All The Sufferings Of Humanity Come Together, He Too, While The Olive Trees Trembled In The Fierce Breath Of The Infinite, Had Brushed Away The Fearful Cup That Appeared Before Him, Streaming With Shadow And Running Over With Darkness, In The Star-filled Depths. (pg. 236)

Love Is The Foolishness Of Men, And The Wisdom Of God.

The Saints Were His Friends, And Blessed Him; The Monsters Were His Friends, And Guarded Him.

Popularity? It's Glory's Small Change.

The Day That A Woman Who Is Passing Before You Sheds A Light Upon You As She Goes, You Are Lost, You Love. You Have Then But One Thing To Do: To Think Of Her So Earnestly That She Will Be Compelled To Think Of You.

Love Is Like A Tree, It Grows Of Its Own Accord, It Puts Down Deep Roots Into Our Whole Being.

This Child Whom We Love, Brings Daylight Into Our Soul.

If A Man Has His Throat Cut In Paris, It's A Murder. If 50,000 People Are Murdered In The East, It Is A Question.

The Women Laughed And Wept; The Crowd Stamped Their Feet Enthusiastically, For At That Moment Quasimodo Was Really Beautiful. He Was Handsome — This Orphan, This Foundling, This Outcast.

My Revenge Is Fraternity! No More Frontiers! The Rhine For Everyone! Let Us Be The Same Republic, Let Us Be The United States Of Europe, Let Us Be The Continental Federation, Let Us Be European Liberty, Let Us Be Universal Peace!

Music Is The Vapor Of Art. It Is To Poetry What Reverie Is To Thought, What Fluid Is To Solid, What The Ocean Of Clouds Is To The Ocean Of Waves.

It Is Most Pleasant To Commit A Just Action Which Is Disagreeable To Someone Whom One Does Not Like.

Men Become Accustomed To Poison By Degrees.

The Real, Native South Seas Food Is Lousy. You Can't Eat It.

Is It Not A Thing Divine To Have A Smile Which, None Know How, Has The Power To Lighten The Weight Of That Enormous Chain Which All The Living In Common Drag Behind Them?

I Will Be Chateaubriand Or Nothing.

If I Have Not Been Exposed And Am Not In Any Danger Of Pursuit. But I Have Been Exposed, I Am Pursued - By Myself! That Is A Pursuer That Does Not Readily Let Go.

‎"dost Thou Understand? I Love Thee!" He Cried Again."what Love!" Said The Unhappy Girl With A Shudder.he Resumed,--"the Love Of A Damned Soul.

It Is Those Books Which A Man Possesses But Does Not Read Which Constitute The Most Suspicious Evidence Against Him.

The Left-handed Are Precious; They Take Places Which Are Inconvenient For The Rest.

If We Must Suffer, Let Us Suffer Nobly.

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.

Melancholy Is The Pleasure Of Being Sad.

What Is Said About Men Often Has As Much Influence Upon Their Lives, And Especially Upon Their Destinies, As What They Do.

Diamonds Are To Be Found Only In The Darkness Of The Earth, And Truth In The Darkness Of The Mind.

Upon The First Goblet He Read This Inscription, Monkey Wine; Upon The Second, Lion Wine; Upon The Third, Sheep Wine; Upon The Fourth, Swine Wine. These Four Inscriptions Expressed The Four Descending Degrees Of Drunkenness: The First, That Which Enlivens; The Second, That Which Irritates; The Third, That Which Stupefies; Finally The Last, That Which Brutalizes.

I Wanted To See You Again, Touch You, Know Who You Were, See If I Would Find You Identical With The Ideal Image Of You Which Had Remained With Me And Perhaps Shatter My Dream With The Aid Of Reality. -claude Frollo

If You Are Leaving That Sorrowful Place With Hate And Anger Against Men, You Are Worthy Of Compassion; If You Leave It With Good Will, Gentleness And Peace, You Are Better Than Any Of Us.

Without Vanity, Without Coquetry, Without Curiosity, In A Word, Without The Fall, Woman Would Not Be Woman. Much Of Her Grace Is In Her Frailty.

What Is Fright By Night Is Curiosity By Day.

A House Is Built Of Logs And Stone, Of Tiles And Posts And Piers; A Home Is Built Of Loving Deeds That Stand A Thousand Years.

The Beautiful Is As Useful As The Useful." He Added After A Moment’s Silence, "perhaps More So.

People Generally Will Soon Understand That Writers Should Be Judged, Not According To Rules And Species, Which Are Contrary To Nature And Art, But According To The Immutable Principles Of The Art Of Composition, And The Special Laws Of Their Individual Temperaments.

Labor Is Life; Thought Is Light.

Thoughts On Life

Intelligence Is The Wife, Imagination Is The Mistress, Memory Is The Servant.

Where The Telescope Ends The Microscope Begins, And Which Has The Wider Vision?

Sorrow Is A Fruit. God Does Not Make It Grow On Limbs Too Weak To Bear It.

What Makes Night Within Us May Leave Stars.

Strange To Say, The Luminous World Is The Invisible World; The Luminous World Is That Which We Do Not See. Our Eyes Of Flesh See Only Night.

She Worked In Order To Live, And Presently Fell In Love, Also In Order To Live, For The Heart, Too, Has Its Hunger.

To Rise From Error To Truth Is Rare And Beautiful.

Have No Fear Of Robbers Or Murderers. They Are External Dangers, Petty Dangers. We Should Fear Ourselves. Prejudices Are The Real Robbers; Vices The Real Murderers. The Great Dangers Are Within Us. Why Worry About What Threatens Our Heads Or Our Purses? Let Us Think Instead Of What Threatens Our Souls.

A Language Does Not Become Fixed. The Human Intellect Is Always On The March, Or, If You Prefer, In Movement, And Languages With It.

Laughter Is The Sun That Drives Winter From The Human Face.

...there Is A Point When The Unfortunate And The Infamous Are Associated And Confused In A Word, A Mortal Word, Les Miserables

Revery, Which Is Thought In Its Nebulous State, Borders Closely Upon The Land Of Sleep, By Which It Is Bounded As By A Natural Frontier.

I Tried. But I Feel That I Haven't Given Utterance To The Thousandth Part Of What Lies Within Me. When I Go To The Grave I Can Say As Others Have Said, "i Have Finished My Day's Work." But I Cannot Say, "i Have Finished My Life." My Day's Work Will Begin Again The Next Morning. The Tomb Is Not A Blind Alley; It Is A Thoroughfare. It Closes On The Twilight, But Opens On The Dawn.

I Advance In Life, I Grow More Simple, And I Become More And More Patriotic For Humanity.

The Greatest Happiness Of Life Is The Conviction That We Are Loved; Loved For Ourselves, Or Rather, Loved In Spite Of Ourselves.

I Exist," Murmurs Someone Whose Name Is Everyone. "i'm Young And In Love; I Am Old And I Want Rest; I Work, I Prosper, I Do Good Business, I Have Houses To Rent, Money In State Securities; I Am Happy, I Have Wife And Children; I Like All These Things And I Want To Go On Living, So Leave Me Alone."... There Are Moments When All This Casts A Deep Chill On The Large-minded Pioneers Of The Human Race.

That Is To Be Two And To Be But One. A Man And A Woman Mingled Into One Angel. It Is Heaven.

Are You Afraid Of The Good You Might Do?

How Frightened Hypocrisy Hastens To Defend Itself.

There Is A Secret Drawer In Every Woman's Heart.

I See Black Light (his Last Words)

M. Mabeuf’s Political Opinion Was A Passionate Fondness For Plants, And A Still Greater One For Books. He Had, Like Everybody Else, His Termination In Ist, Without Which Nobody Could Have Lived In Those Times, But He Was Neither A Royalist, Nor A Bonapartist, Nor A Chartist, Nor An Orleanist, Nor An Anarchist; He Was An Old-bookist.

Political Opinions

The Paradise Of The Rich Is Made Out Of The Hell Of The Poor.

A Republic May Be Called The Climate Of Civilization.

A Poet Is A World Enclosed In A Man.

Strong And Bitter Words Indicate A Weak Cause.

Ma Vie Est Une énigme Dont Ton Nom Est Le Mot. (my Life Is An Enigma, Of Which Your Name Is The Word.)

Animals Are Nothing But The Portrayal Of Our Virtues And Vices Made Manifest To Our Eyes, The Visible Reflections Of Our Souls.

Philosophy Should Be An Energy; It Should Find Its Aim And Its Effect In The Amelioration Of Mankind.

These Greek Capitals, Black With Age, And Quite Deeply Graven In The Stone, With I Know Not What Signs Peculiar To Gothic Calligraphy Imprinted Upon Their Forms And Upon Their Attitudes, As Though With The Purpose Of Revealing That It Had Been A Hand Of The Middle Ages Which Had Inscribed Them There, And Especially The Fatal And Melancholy Meaning Contained In Them, Struck The Author Deeply.

The Tomb Is Not A Blind Alley: It Is A Thoroughfare. It Closes On The Twilight. It Opens On The Dawn.

Progress Is The Life-style Of Man.

Nothing Makes A Man So Adventurous As An Empty Pocket.

Nothing Is More Dangerous Than Discontinued Labor; It Is Habit Lost. A Habit Easy To Abandon, Difficult To Resume.

These Are Dark Radiances. They Have No Suspicion That They Are To Be Pitied. Certainly They Are So. He Who Does Not Weep Does Not See. They Are To Be Admired And Pitied, As One Would Both Pity And Admire A Being At Once Night And Day, Without Eyes Beneath His Lashes But With A Star On His Brow.

I'm Religiously Opposed To Religion.

Nature, Like A Kind And Smiling Mother, Lends Herself To Our Dreams And Cherishes Our Fancies.

Don't Educate Your Children To Be Rich. Educate Them To Be Happy, So They Know The Value Of Things, Not The Price.

Youth Is The Future Smiling At A Stranger, Which Is Itself.

Blessed Be Providence Which Has Given To Each His Toy: The Doll To The Child, The Child To The Woman, The Woman To The Man, The Man To The Devil!

Does Not Beauty Confer A Benefit Upon Us, Even By The Simple Fact Of Being Beautiful?

And If It Happened To Be A Christmas-night When The Great Bell Seemed To Rattle In Its Throat As It Called The Faithful To The Midnight Mass, There Was Such An Indescribable Air Of Life Spread Over The Sombre Facade That The Great Door-way Looked As If It Were Swallowing The Entire Crowd, And The Rose-window Staring At Them.

We Would Be Ashamed Of Our Best Behavior If The People Knew The Motives Of Our Behaving So.

Everything Bows To Success, Even Grammar.

Every Idea Must Have A Visible Enfolding.

Revolution Is The Larva Of Civilization.

Wisdom Is A Sacred Communion.

Sire, You Are Looking At A Plain Man, And I Am Looking At A Great Man. Each Of Us May Benefit.

Wisdom Is The Health Of The Soul.

Almost All Our Desires, When Examined, Contain Something Too Shameful To Reveal.

Love, Thine Is The Future. Death, I Use Thee, But I Hate Thee. Citizens, There Shall Be In The Future Neither Darkness Nor Thunderbolts; Neither Ferocious Ignorance Nor Blood For Blood.

The Most Terrible Of Motives And The Most Unanswerable Of Responses: Because.

A Sewer Is A Cynic. It Tells All.

Everything Being A Constant Carnival, There Is No Carnival Left.

God Has Made The Cat To Give Man The Pleasure Of Caressing The Tiger.

A Day Will Come When All Nations On Our Continent Will Form A European Brotherhood... A Day Will Come When We Shall See... The United States Of America And The United States Of Europe Face To Face, Reaching Out For Each Other Across The Seas.

There Are Moments When A Rope's End, A Pole, The Branch Of The Tree, Is Life Itself, And It Is A Frightful Thing To See A Living Being Lose His Hold Upon It, And Fall Like A Ripe Fruit.

There Is Such A Thing As The Pressure Of Darkness.

Do Not Let It Be Your Aim To Be Something, But To Be Someone.

It Has Become Necessary To Call The Attention Of European Governments To A Fact Which Is Apparently So Insignificant That The Governments Seem Not To Notice It. The Fact Is This: An Entire People Is Being Annihilated. Where? In Europe. Are There Witnesses? One Witness, The Entire World. Do The Governments See It? No.

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