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[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.

-Honore De Balzac

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[raphael's] Great Superiority Is

Honore De Balzac

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[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.

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Do You Know How A Man Makes His Way Here? By Brilliant Genius Or By Skilful Corruption. You Must Either Cut Your Way Through These Masses Of Men Like A Cannon Ball, Or Steal Among Them Like A Plague.

There Is Nothing Original; All Is Reflected Light.

No Man Should Marry Until He Has Studied Anatomy And Dissected At Least One Woman.

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

Love Is Perhaps No More Than Gratitude For Pleasure.

Girls Are Apt To Imagine Noble And Enchanting And Totally Imaginary Figures In Their Own Minds; They Have Fanciful Extravagant Ideas About Men, And Sentiment, And Life; And Then They Innocently Endow Somebody Or Other With All The Perfections For Their Daydreams, And Put Their Trust In Him.

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

The Questioning Spirit Is The Rebellious Spirit. A Rebellion Is Always Either A Cloak To Hide A Prince, Or The Swaddling Wrapper Of A New Rule.

The Duration Of Passion Is Proportionate With The Original Resistance Of The Woman.

The Greatest Joy A Petty Soul Can Taste Is To Dupe A Great Soul And Catch It In A Snare.

Ideas Devour The Ages As Men Are Devoured By Their Passions. When Man Is Cured, Human Nature Will Cure Itself Perhaps.

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

A Man Who Stops At Nothing Short Of The Law Is Very Clever Indeed!

Among Fifty Percent Of Your Married Couples, The Husband Worries Very Little About What His Wife Is Doing, Provided She Is Doing All He Wishes.

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.

A Woman Filled With Faith In The One She Loves Is The Creation Of A Novelist's Imagination.

Thinking Is Seeing.... Every Human Science Is Based On Deduction, Which Is A Slow Process Of Seeing By Which We Work Up From The Effect To The Cause; Or, In A Wider Sense, All Poetry Like Every Work Of Art Proceeds From A Swift Vision Of Things.

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.

Nothing Is As Heady As The Wine Of Misfortune.

It Is Quite Right What They Say: The Three Most Beautiful Sights In The World Are A Ship In Full Sail, A Galloping Horse, And A Woman Dancing.

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.

Between The Daylight Gambler And The Player At Night There Is The Same Difference That Lies Between A Careless Husband And The Lover Swooning Under His Lady's Window.

Six Weeks With A Fever Is An Eternity.

Ah! What Pleasure It Must Be To A Woman To Suffer For The One She Loves!

Our Most Natural Feelings Are Those We Are Loath To Confess, And Fatuity Is Among Them.

Natural Feelings

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.

To Stroll Is A Science, It Is The Gastronomy Of The Eye. To Walk Is To Vegetate, To Stroll Is To Live.... To Stroll Is To Enjoy, It Is To Assume A Mind-set, It Is To Admire The Sublime Pictures Of Unhappiness, Of Love, Of Joy, Of Graceful Or Grotesque Portraits; It Is To Plunge One's Vision To The Depths Of A Thousand Existences: Young, It Is To Desire Everything; Old, It Is To Live The Life Of The Young, To Marry Their Passions.

Carelessness In Dressing Is Moral Suicide.

When She Lives At His Palace, The Maiden Niece Of A Bishop Can Pass For A Respectable Woman Because, If She Has A Love Affair, She Is Obliged To Hoodwink Her Uncle.

Like Hunger, Physical Love Is A Necessity. But Man's Appetite For Amour Is Never So Regular Or So Sustained As His Appetite For The Delights Of The Table.

Love Is A Religion, And Its Rituals Cost More Than Those Of Other Religions. It Goes By Quickly And, Like A Street Urchin, It Likes To Mark Its Passage By A Trail Of Devastation.

There Are Some Women Whose Pregnancy Would Make Some Sly Bachelor Smile.

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

Women Are Tenacious, And All Of Them Should Be Tenacious Of Respect; Without Esteem They Cannot Exist; Esteem Is The First Demand That They Make Of Love.

The Woman Who Is About To Deceive Her Husband Always Carefully Thinks Out How She Is Going To Act, But She Is Never Logical.

White Hair Often Covers The Head, But The Heart That Holds It Is Ever Young.

God Reveals Himself, Unfailingly, To The Solitary, Thoughtful Seeker

We Must Have Books For Recreation And Entertainment, As Well As Books For Instruction And For Business; The Former Are Agreeable, The Latter Useful, And The Human Mind Requires Both. The Cannon Law And The Codes Of Justinian Shall Have Due Honor, And Reign At The Universities; But Homer And Virgil Need Not Therefore Be Banished. We Will Cultivate The Olive And The Vine, But Without Eradicating The Myrtle And The Rose.

The Greatest Tyranny Is To Love I Where We Are Not Loved Again.

Time Is The Only Capital Of Those Who Just Have Their Inteligence As Fortune.

Remorse Is Impotence, Impotence Which Sins Again. Repentance Alone Is Powerful; It Ends All.

White And Shining Virgin Of All Human Virtues, Ark Of The Covenant Between Earth And Heaven, Tender And Strong Companion Partaking Of The Lion And Of The Lamb, Prayer! Prayer Will Give You The Key Of Heaven! Bold And Pure As Innocence, Strong, Like All That Is Single And Simple, This Glorious, Invincible Queen Rests, Nevertheless, On The Material World; She Takes Possession Of It; Like The Sun, She Clasps It In A Circle Of Light.

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.

If Certain Women Walk Straight Into Adultery, There Are Many Others Who Cling To Numerous Hopes, And Commit Sin Only After Wandering Through A Maze Of Sorrows.

Possibly The Words Materialism And Spirituality Express Two Sides Of One And The Same Fact.

Today Nobility Is Gone: There Is Only A Peerage.

It Is The Mark Of A Great Man That He Puts To Flight All Ordinary Calculations. He Is At Once Sublime And Touching, Childlike And Of The Race Of Giants.

The Impossible Is Justified By The Fact That It Occurred

There Are Houses In Certain Provincial Towns Whose Aspect Inspires Melancholy, Akin To That Called Forth By Sombre Cloisters, Dreary Moorlands, Or The Desolation Of Ruins. Within These Houses There Is, Perhaps, The Silence Of The Cloister, The Barrenness Of Moors, The Skeleton Of Ruins; Life And Movement Are So Stagnant There That A Stranger Might Think Them Uninhabited, Were It Not That He Encounters Suddenly The Pale, Cold Glance Of A Motionless Person, Whose Half-monastic Face Peers Beyond The Window-casing At The Sound Of An Unaccustomed Step.

If You Are To Judge A Man, You Must Know His Secret Thoughts, Sorrows, And Feelings; To Know Merely The Outward Events Of A Man's Life Would Only Serve To Make A Chronological Table-a Fool's Notion Of History.

Poles Offer A Mobility Like That Of The Wind That Blows Over The Immense Plains And Marches Of Poland. Show A Pole A Precipice, And He Will Leap Headlong Over It.

In Diving To The Bottom Of Pleasure We Bring Up More Gravel Than Pearls.

Women Are As They Are; They Necessarily Have The Defects Of Their Virtues.

All Human Power Is A Compound Of Time And Patience.

The More Illegal A Profit, The More Tenaciously A Man Clings To It.

Love, According To Our Contemporary Poets, Is A Privilege Which Two Beings Confer Upon One Another, Whereby They May Mutually Cause One Another Much Sorrow Over Absolutely Nothing.

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.

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

On The Moral Plane, True Friends Enjoy The Same Protection As The Sense Of Smell Confers Upon Dogs. They Scent The Sorrow Of Their Friends, They Divine Its Causes, And They Clasp It To Their Minds And Hearts.

Love Which Economizes Is Never True Love.

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.

When You Doubt Your Power, You Give Power To Your Doubt.

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

There Are Moments In Life When All We Can Bear Is The Sense That Our Friend Is Near Us; Our Wounds Would Wince At The Touch Of Consoling Words, That Would Reveal The Depths Of Our Pain.

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

Envy Is The Most Stupid Of Vices, For There Is No Single Advantage To Be Gained From It.

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

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.

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.

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

In Love, What A Woman Mistakes For Disgust Is Actually Clearsightedness. If She Does Not Admire A Man, She Scorns Him.

Clouds Signify The Veil Of The Most High.

The Glutton Is Much More Than An Animal And Much Less Than A Man.

Nothing Is Unimportant To A Man Plunged In Despair. He Is As Credulous As A Criminal Sentenced To Death Who Listens To A Lunatic Raving To Him About How He Can Escape Through The Keyhole.

We Are Scarcely Apt To Berate The Source Of Enjoyment.

Men Die In Despair, While Spirits Die In Ecstasy.

Poets And Men Of Action Differ: The Former Yield To Their Feelings In Order To Reproduce Them In Lively Colors, And Therefore Judge Only Ex Post Facto; The Latter Feel And Judge At One And The Same Time.

Are Not Our Noblest Feelings As It Were The Poems Of Our Will.

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.

The Secret Of The Nobility And Beauty Of Great Ladies Lies In The Art With Which They Can Shed Their Veils. In Such Situations, They Become Like Ancient Statues. If They Kept The Merest Scarf On, They Would Be Lewd. Your Bourgeois Woman Will Always Try To Cover Her Nakedness.

Passions Are No More Forgiving Than Human Laws And They Reason More Justly. Are They Not Based On A Conscience Of Their Own, Infallible As An Instinct?

Some Troubles, Like A Protested Note Of A Solvent Debtor, Bear Interest.

The Man Whose Action Habitually Bears The Stamp Of His Mind Is A Genius, But The Greatest Genius Is Not Always Equal To Himself, Or He Would Cease To Be Human.

My Writing Table Has Seen All My Wretchedness, Knows All My Plans, Has Overheard All My Thoughts.

We Flew Back Home Like Swallows. 'is It Happiness That Makes Us So Light?' Agathe Asked.

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.

A Young Bride Is Like A Plucked Flower; But A Guilty Wife Is Like A Flower That Had Been Walked Over.

Woman Is Closer To Angels Than Man Because She Knows How To Mingle An Infinite Tenderness With The Most Absolute Compassion.

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

Necessity Is Often The Spur To Genius.

I'm A Great Poet. I Don't Put My Poems On Paper: They Consist Of Actions And Feelings.

If Those Who Are The Enemies Of Innocent Amusements Had The Direction Of The World, They Would Take Away The Spring, And Youth, The Former From The Year, The Latter From Human Life.

No Society Is Complete Without Some Victim, A Creature To Pity, To Jeer At, To Scorn Or To Protect.

Temperament Is The Thermometer Of Character.

Le Bonheur Engloutit Nos Forces, Comme Le Malheur E Teint Nos Vertus. Happiness Engulfs Our Strength, Just As Misfortune Extinguishes Our Virtues.

The Habits Of Life Form The Soul, And The Soul Forms The Physical Presence.

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.

In The Silence Of Their Studios, Busied For Days At A Time With Works Which Leave The Mind Relatively Free, Painters Become Like Women; Their Thoughts Can Revolve Around The Minor Facts Of Life And Penetrate Their Hidden Meaning.

As A Rule, Only The Poor Are Generous. Rich People Can Always Find Excellent Reasons For Not Handing Over Twenty Thousand Francs To A Relative.

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

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!

The Smallest Flower Is A Thought, A Life Answering To Some Feature Of The Great Whole, Of Whom They Have A Persistent Intuition.

The Man As He Converses Is The Lover; Silent, He Is The Husband.

Some Day You Will Find Out That There Is Far More Happiness In Another's Happiness Than In Your Own.

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

Vocations Which We Wanted To Pursue, But Didn't, Bleed, Like Colors, On The Whole Of Our Existence.

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.

Reading Brings Us Unknown Friends

Suicide, Moreover, Was At The Time In Vogue In Paris: What More Suitable Key To The Mystery Of Life For A Skeptical Society?

When A Woman Wants To Betray Her Husband, Her Actions Are Almost Invariably Studied But They Are Never Reasoned.

People Who Are In Love Suspect Nothing Or Everything.

Power Is Action; The Electoral Principle Is Discussion. No Political Action Is Possible When Discussion Is Permanently Established.

Lovers Have A Way Of Using This Word "nothing" Which Implies Exactly The Opposite.

Our Souls Possess The Unknown Power Of Extending As Well As Contracting Space.

Woman Is A Most Charming Creature, Who Changes Her Heart As Easily As She Does Her Gloves.

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

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

But Reason Always Cuts A Poor Figure Beside Sentiment; The One Being Essentially Restricted, Like Everything That Is Positive, While The Other Is Infinite.

Even Beauty Cannot Always Palliate Eccentricity.

To Feel, To Love, To Suffer, To Devote Herself, Will Always Be The Text Of The Life Of Woman.

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.

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.

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!

Our Heart Is A Treasury; If You Pour Out All Its Wealth At Once, You Are Bankrupt.

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

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.

Nobody Loves A Woman Because She Is Handsome Or Ugly, Stupid Or Intelligent. We Love Because We Love.

Falling In Love

Hatred Is The Vice Of Narrow Souls; They Feed It With All Their Littleness, And Make It The Pretext Of Base Tyrannies.

Genius Is Answerable Only To Itself; It Is The Sole Judge Of The Means, Since It Alone Knows The End; Thus Genius Must Consider Itself As Above The Law, For It Is The Task Of Genius To Remake The Law; Moreover The Man Who Frees Himself From His Time And Place May Take Everything, Hazard Everything, For Everything Is His By Right.

Hatred Like Love Feeds On The Merest Trifles.

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

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

Nothing Is Irredeemably Ugly But Sin.

Emulation Admires And Strives To Imitate Great Actions; Envy Is Only Moved To Malice.

Behind Every Fortune There Is A Crime.

Gratitude Is A Fool's Word; We Find It In The Dictionary, But It Is Not In The Heart Of Man.

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?

Those Sweetly Smiling Angels With Pensive Looks, Innocent Faces, And Cash-boxes For Hearts.

What Is Art? Nature Concentrated.

Nothing Can Afford A Woman Greater Pleasure Than To Hear Tender Words Of Love. The Strictest, Most Devout Woman Will Listen Even If She Must Not Answer.

Show Me The Woman, However Loyal, Who Does Not Seek To Rouse Desire.

Generally Our Confidences Move Downward Rather Than Upward; In Our Secret Affairs, We Employ Our Inferiors Much More Than Our Bettors.

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.

Great Love Affairs Start With Champagne And End With Tisane.

A Deist Is An Atheist With An Eye Cocked For The Off-chance Of Some Advantage.

There Are As Many Mediocrities Exalted Through Pity As Masters Decried Through Envy.

Now Literary Success Can Only Be Won In Solitude By Persevering Labor.

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?

Kindness Steers No Easy Course. Attributing It To Character, We Seldom Recognize The Secret Efforts Of A Noble Heart, Whereas We Reward Really Wicked People For The Evil They Refrain From Committing.

While Seeking Out The Dead, I See Nothing But The Living.

All Poetry Like Every Work Of Art Proceeds From A Swift Vision Of Things.

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

Small Natures Require Despotism To Exercise Their Sinews, As Great Souls Thirst For Equality To Give Play To Their Heart.

To Be Happy, A Man Must Love His Wife As She Chooses To Be Loved.

We Cannot Confront Solitude Without Moral Resources.

The Parisan, Sauntering The Streets Idly, Is As Often A Man In Despair As A Lounger.

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.

Vice Is Perhaps A Desire To Learn Everything.

Desire To Learn

All Happiness Depends On Courage And Work.

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?

Imaginative, Sanguine Men Will Never Recognize That In Negotiations The Most Dangerous Moment Of All Is When Everything Is Moving According To Their Wishes.

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

Ah! How Much A Mother Learns From Her Child! The Constant Protection Of A Helpless Being Forces Us To So Strict An Alliance With Virtue, That A Woman Never Shows To Full Advantage Except As A Mother. Then Alone Can Her Character Expand In The Fulfillment Of All Life's Duties And The Enjoyment Of All Its Pleasures.

Are Not Poets Men Who Fulfill Their Hopes Prematurely?

Let Nothing Dupe You! Such Is The Horrible Maxim That Acts As A Solvent Upon Every Noble Feeling Man Experiences.

No Frozen-hearted Woman Ever I Laid Eyes On But Has Made Duty Her Religion.

The More One Judges, The Less One Loves.

Let Us Leave The Cure Of Public Evils To Those Quacks, The Statesmen.

Your Modest Savant Smiles As He Says To His Admirers: What Have I Done? Nothing. Man Does Not Invent A Force, He Directs It.

Admiration Bestowed Upon Any One But Ourselves Is Always Tedious.

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?

Want Him To Be More Of A Man? Try Being More Of A Woman!

A Man Is A Poor Creature Compared To A Woman.

A Society Of Atheists Would Immediately Invent A Religion.

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.

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

The Most Real Of All Splendors Are Not In Outward Things, They Are Within Us.

A Man May And Ought To Pride Himself More On His Will Than On His Talent.

Misfortune Makes Of Certain Souls A Vast Desert Through Which Rings The Voice Of God.

Thanks To The Toleration Preached By The Encyclopedists Of The Eighteenth Century, The Sorcerer Is Exempt From Torture.

Society Bristles With Enigmas Which Look Hard To Solve. It Is A Perfect Maze Of Intrigue.

Death Is As Unexpected In His Caprice As A Courtesan In Her Disdain; But Death Is Truer – Death Has Never Forsaken Any Man

Nowhere But In France Are People So Strictly Observant Of Great Matters And So Disdainfully Indulgent About Small Ones.

Gentleness In The Gait Is What Simplicity Is In The Dress. Violent Gestures Or Quick Movements Inspire Involuntary Disrespect.

A Flow Of Words Is A Sure Sign Of Duplicity.

Virtue In Women Is Perhaps A Question Of Temperament.

Journalism Is A Giant Catapult Set In Motion By Pigmy Hatreds.

When Chaste People Need Body Or Mind To Resort To Action Or Thought, They Find Steel In Their Muscles Or Knowledge In Their Intelligence. Theirs The Diabolic Vigor Or The Black Magic Of Will Power.

Love Passes Quickly, And Passes Like A Street Arab, Anxious To Mark His Way With Mischief.

Hatred Like Love Feeds On The Merest Trifles. Everything Adds To It. Just As The Being We Love Can Do No Wrong, So The One We Hate Can Do No Right.

Sensuality Is The Death Of The Soul.

Several Sorts Of Memory Exist In Us; Body And Mind Each Possesses One Peculiar To Itself. Nostalgia, For Instance, Is A Malady Of The Physical Memory.

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

La Femme Marie E Est Un Esclave Qu'il Faut Savoir Mettre Sur Un Tro" N E. A Married Woman Is A Slave Whom One Must Put On A Throne.

A Jealous Husband Doesnt Doubt His Wife, But Himself.

Marriageable Girls As Well As Mothers Understand The Terms And Perils Of The Lottery Called Wedlock. That Is Why Women Weep At A Wedding And Men Smile.

There Are No Principles; There Are Only Events. There Is No Good And Bad, There Are Only Circumstances.

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

A Murderer Is Less Loathsome To Us Than A Spy. The Murderer May Have Acted On A Sudden Mad Impulse; He May Be Penitent And Amend; But A Spy Is Always A Spy, Night And Day, In Bed, At Table, As He Walks Abroad; His Vileness Pervades Every Moment Of His Life

Conscience Is Our Unerring Judge Until We Finally Stifle It.

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