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The Book Which The Reader Now Holds In His Hands, From One End To The Other, As A Whole And In Its Details, Whatever Gaps, Exceptions, Or Weaknesses It May Contain, Treats Of The Advance From Evil To Good, From Injustice To Justice, From Falsity To Truth, From Darkness To Daylight, From Blind Appetite To Conscience, From Decay To Life, From Bestiality To Duty, From Hell To Heaven, From Limbo To God. Matter Itself Is The Starting-point, And The Point Of Arrival Is The Soul. Hydra At The Beginning, An Angel At The End.

-Victor Hugo

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The Book Which The

Victor Hugo

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The Book Which The Reader Now Holds In His Hands, From One End To The Other, As A Whole And In Its Details, Whatever Gaps, Exceptions, Or Weaknesses It May Contain, Treats Of The Advance From Evil To Good, From Injustice To Justice, From Falsity To Truth, From Darkness To Daylight, From Blind Appetite To Conscience, From Decay To Life, From Bestiality To Duty, From Hell To Heaven, From Limbo To God. Matter Itself Is The Starting-point, And The Point Of Arrival Is The Soul. Hydra At The Beginning, An Angel At The End.

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To Be Perfectly Happy It Does Not Suffice To Possess Happiness, It Is Necessary To Have Deserved It.

He Had Not Yet Lived Long Enough To Have Discovered That Nothing Is More Close At Hand Then The Impossible, And That What Must Be Looked For Is Always The Unforeseen.

The Little People Must Be Sacred To The Big Ones, And It Is From The Rights Of The Weak That The Duty Of The Strong Is Comprised.

To Be A Saint Is The Exception; To Be A Just Person Is The Rule. Err, Stumble, Commit Sin, But Be One Of The Just.

Every Blade Has Two Edges; He Who Wounds With One Wounds Himself With The Other.

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.

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!

The Most Beautiful Of Altars, He Said, Is The Soul Of An Unhappy Creature Consoled And Thankfing God.

It Is Often Our Best Friends Who Throw Us Down.

The Pupil Dilates In Darkness And In The End Finds Light, Just As The Soul Dilates In Misfortune And In The End Finds God.

Let Us Sacrifice One Day To Gain Perhaps A Whole Life.

I Like The Laughter That Opens The Lips And The Heart, Shows At The Same Time The Pearls And The Soul.

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.

Life Is A Theatre Set In Which There Are But Few Practicable Entrances.

The Reduction Of The Universe To The Compass Of A Single Being, And The Extension Of A Single Being Until It Reaches God - That Is Love. Love Is The Salute Of The Angels To The Stars. How Sad Is The Heart When Rendered Sad By Love! How Great Is The Void Created By The Absence Of The Being Who Alone Fills The World.

If You Want To Civilize A Man, Begin With His Grandmother.

Forget Not, Never Forget That You Have Promised Me To Use This Silver To Become An Honest Man.... Jean Valjean, My Brother: You Belong No Longer To Evil, But To Good. It Is Your Soul That I Am Buying For You. I Withdraw It From Dark Thoughts And From The Spirit Of Perdition, And I Give It To God!

Man Lives More By Affirmation Than By Bread.

Not Seeing People Allows You To Think Of Them As Perfect In All Kinds Of Ways.

Symmetry Is Tedious, And Tedium Is The Very Basis Of Mourning. Despair Yawns.

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.

Yes, Instruction! Light! Light! Everything Comes From Light, And To Everything It Returns.

There Is A Sacred Horror About Everything Grand. It Is Easy To Admire Mediocrity And Hills; But Whatever Is Too Lofty, A Genius As Well As A Mountain, An Assembly As Well As A Masterpiece, Seen Too Near, Is Appalling.

Never Laugh At Those Who Suffer; Suffer Sometimes Those Who Laugh.

Marius And Cosette Were In The Dark In Regard To Each Other. They Did Not Speak, They Did Not Bow, They Were Not Acquainted; They Saw Each Other; And, Like The Stars In The Sky Separated By Millions Of Leagues, They Lived By Gazing Upon Each Other.

There Are No Weeds, And No Worthless Men. There Are Only Bad Farmers.

What I Feel For You Seems Less Of Earth And More Of A Cloudless Heaven.

In The Twentieth Century War Will Be Dead, The Scaffold Will Be Dead, Hatred Will Be Dead, Frontier Boundaries Will Be Dead, Dogmas Will Be Dead; Man Will Live. He Will Possess Something Higher Than All These-a Great Country, The Whole Earth, And A Great Hope, The Whole Heaven.

Whenever A Man's Friends Begin To Compliment Him About Looking Young, He May Be Sure That They Think He Is Growing Old.

Great Buildings, Like Great Mountains, Are The Work Of Centuries.

A Wedding Is Not House-keeping.

He Who Opens A School Door, Closes A Prison.

An Increase Of Tenderness Always Ended By Boiling Over And Turning To Indignation. He Was At The Point Where We Seek To Adopt A Course, And To Accept What Tears Us Apart.

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

Certain Thoughts Are Prayers. There Are Moments When, Whatever Be The Attitude Of The Body, The Soul Is On Its Knees.

God Will Reward You,' He Said. 'you Must Be An Angel Since You Care For Flowers.

As With Stomachs, We Should Pity Minds That Do Not Eat.

There Is No More Sovereign Eloquence Than The Truth In Indignation.

Fashions Have Done More Harm Than Revolutions.

The Transept Belfry And The Two Towers Were To Him Three Great Cages, The Birds In Which, Taught By Him, Would Sing For Him Alone. Yet It Was These Same Bells Which Had Made Him Deaf; But Mothers Are Often Fondest Of The Child Who Has Made Them Suffer Most.

He Who Is Not Master Of His Own Thoughts Is Not Accountable For His Own Deeds.

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

Often The Losing Of A Battle Leads To The Winning Of Progress. Less Glory But Greater Liberty: The Drum Is Silent And The Voices Of Reason Can Be Heard.

Woman, Nude, Is The Blue Sky. Clouds And Garments Are An Obstacle To Contemplation. Beauty And Infinity Would Be Gazed Upon Unveiled.

And, Moreover, When It Happens That Both Are Sincere And Good, Nothing Will Mix And Amalgamate More Easily Than An Old Priest And An Old Soldier. In Reality, They Are The Same Kind Of Man. One Has Devoted Himself To Country Upon Earth, The Other To His Country In Heaven; There Is No Other Difference.

I Put A Phrygian Cap On The Old Dictionary.

Creation Lives, Grows, And Multiplies; Man Is But A Witness.

You Have Enemies? Why, It Is The Story Of Every Man Who Has Done A Great Deed Or Created A New Idea. It Is The Cloud Which Thunders Around Everything That Shines. Fame Must Have Enemies, As Light Must Have Gnats. Do No Bother Yourself About It; Disdain. Keep Your Mind Serene As You Keep Your Life Clear.

Vengeance Comes From The Individual And Punishment From God.

What Dangers You Run, O Noble Souls! Often, You Give Your Heart, But We Take Only Your Body. Your Heart Is Left To You And You Look At It In The Shadows And Shudder.

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.

Religions Do A Useful Thing: They Narrow God To The Limits Of Man. Philosophy Replies By Doing A Necessary Thing: It Elevates Man To The Plane Of God.

Human Intelligence Discovered A Way Of Perpetuating Itself, One Not Only More Durable And More Resistant Than Architecture, But Also Simpler And Easier. Architecture Was Dethroned. The Stone Letters Of Orpheus Gave Way To The Lead Letters Of Gutenburg. The Book Will Kill The Edifice.

The Ox Suffers, The Cart Complains.

The Word Is The Verb, And The Verb Is God.

Logic Ignores The Almost, Just As The Sun Ignores The Candle.

Gutenberg's Invention Of Printing Is The Greatest Event-the Mother Of Revolution

The Production Of Souls Is The Secret Of Unfathomable Depth.

Do Not Economize On The Hymeneal Rites; Do Not Prune Them Of Their Splendor, Nor Split Farthings On The Day When You Are Radiant. A Wedding Is Not House-keeping.

Virtue Has A Veil, Vice A Mask.

Too Much Improvisation Leaves The Mind Stupidly Void.

The Learned Man Knows That He Is Ignorant.

The Realities Of Life Do Not Allow Themselves To Be Forgotten.

Reality Of Life

The Clouds, - The Only Birds That Never Sleep.

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.

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

Another Story Must Begin!

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."

Every Idea Must Have A Visible Enfolding.

Every Bird Which Flies Has The Thread Of The Infinite In Its Claw.

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

What Is The Cat?" He Exclaimed. "it Is A Corrective. God, Having Made The Mouse, Said, 'i've Made A Blunder.' And He Made The Cat. The Cat Is The Erratum Of The Mouse. The Mouse, Plus The Cat, Is The Revised And Corrected Proof Of Creation.

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.

Dying Is Nothing. What's Terrible Is Not To Live.

At A Certain Depth Of Distress, The Poor, In Their Stupor, Groan No Longer Over Evil, And Are No Longer Thankful For Good.

There Are No Trifles In The Human Story, No Trifling Leaves On The Tree.

Nature Has Made A Pebble And A Female. The Lapidary Makes The Diamond, And The Lover Makes The Woman.

Was It Possible That Napoleon Should Win The Battle Of Waterloo? We Answer, No! Why? Because Of Wellington? Because Of Blucher? No! Because Of God! For Bonaparte To Conquer At Waterloo Was Not The Law Of The Nineteenth Century. It Was Time That This Vast Man Should Fall. He Had Been Impeached Before The Infinite! He Had Vexed God! Waterloo Was Not A Battle. It Was The Change Of Front Of The Universe!

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

Love Is A Fault; So Be It.

I'm Religiously Opposed To Religion.

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.

Dark Error's Other Hidden Side Is Truth.

If You Wish To Understand What Revolution Is, Call It Progress; And If You Wish To Understand What Progress Is, Call It Tomorrow.

Inanimate Objects Sometimes Appear Endowed With A Strange Power Of Sight. A Statue Notices, A Tower Watches, The Face Of An Edifice Contemplates.

There Are Things Stronger Than The Strongest Man.

Hypocrisy Is Nothing, In Fact, But A Horrible Hopefulness.

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

When We Are At The End Of Life, To Die Means To Go Away; When We Are At The Beginning, To Go Away Means To Die.

If You Look In The Eyes Of The Young, You See Flame. If You Look In The Eyes Of The Old, You See Light.

The Drama Is Complete Poetry. The Ode And The Epic Contain It Only In Germ; It Contains Both Of Them In A State Of High Development, And Epitomizes Both.

There Is No Such Thing As A Little Country. The Greatness Of A People Is No More Determined By Their Numbers Than The Greatness Of A Man Is By His Height.

Dear God! How Beauty Varies In Nature And Art.

Close By The Rights Of Man, At The Least Set Beside Them, Are The Rights Of The Spirit.

To Think Of Shadows Is A Serious Thing.

One Cannot Be A Good Historian Of The Outward, Visible World Without Giving Some Thought To The Hidden, Private Life Of Ordinary People; And On The Other Hand One Cannot Be A Good Historian Of This Inner Life Without Taking Into Account Outward Events Where These Are Relevant.

It Is In The Name Of Moses That Bellarmin Thunderstrikes Galileo; And This Great Vulgarizer Of The Great Seeker Copernicus, Galileo, The Old Man Of Truth, The Magian Of The Heavens, Was Reduced To Repeating On His Knees Word For Word After The Inquisitor This Formula Of Shame: "corde Sincera Et Fide Non Ficta Abjuro Maledico Et Detestor Supradictos Errores Et Hereses." Falsehood Put An Ass's Hood On Science.

Success Is A Very Hideous Thing. Its False Resemblance To Merit Deceives Men.

And Then, Strange To Say, The First Symptom Of True Love In A Young Man Is Timidity; In A Girl, It Is Boldness.

Indigestion Is Charged By God With Enforcing Morality On The Stomach.

From The Oyster To The Eagle, From The Swine To The Tiger, All Animals Are To Be Found In Men And Each Of Them Exists In Some Man, Sometimes Several At The Time. Animals Are Nothing But The Portrayal Of Our Virtues And Vices Made Manifest To Our Eyes, The Visible Reflections Of Our Souls. God Displays Them To Us To Give Us Food For Thought.

What Says The Law? You Will Not Kill. How Does It Say It? By Killing!

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

Love Is The Salutation Of The Angel To The Stars

...the Girls Chirped And Chatted Like Uncaged Warblers. They Were Delirious With Joy... Intoxications Of Life’s Morning! Enchanted Years! The Wing Of A Dragonfly Trembles! Oh, Reader, Whoever You May Be, Do You Have Such Memories? Have You Walked In The Underbrush, Pushing Aside Branches For The Charming Head Behind You? Have You Slid Laughing, Down Some Slope Wet With Rain, With The Woman You Loved?

It Is An Unpleasant Thing To Go To Bed Without Supper, It Is A Still Less Pleasant Thing Not To Sup And Not To Know Where One Is To Sleep.

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.

True Or False, That Which Is Said Of Men Often Occupies As Important A Place In Their Lives, And Above All In Their Destinies, As That Which They Do.

The Beginning As Well As The End Of All His Thoughts Was Hatred Of Human Law, That Hatred Which, If It Be Not Checked In Its Growth By Some Providential Event, Becomes, In A Certain Time, Hatred Of Society, Then Hatred Of The Human Race, And Then Hatred Of Creation, And Reveals Itself By A Vague And Incessant Desire To Injure Some Living Being, It Matters Not Who.

Nothing Is So Stifling As Symmetry. Symmetry Is Boredom, The Quintessence Of Mourning. Despair Yawns. There Is Something More Terrible Than A Hell Of Suffering - A Hell Of Boredom.

Of All The Things That God Has Made, The Human Heart Is The One Which Sheds The Most Light, Alas! And The Most Darkness.

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)

Diamonds Are Found Only In The Dark Bowels Of The Earth; Truths Are Found Only In The Depths Of Thought. It Seemed To Him That After Descending Into Those Depths After Long Groping In The Blackest Of This Darkness, He Had At Last Found One Of These Diamonds, One Of These Truths, And That He Held It In His Hand; And It Blinded Him To Look At It. (pg. 231)

I Am For Religion, Against Religions.

Against Religion

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

To Rise From Error To Truth Is Rare And Beautiful.

A Little Girl Without A Doll Is Almost As Unhappy, And Quite As Impossible, As A Woman Without Children." From Chapter Viii Of Les Miserables

Taste Is The Common Sense Of Genius.

He Was At His Own Request And Through His Own Complicity Driven Out Of All His Happinesses One After The Other; And He Had This Sorrow, That After Having Lost Cosette Wholly In One Day, He Was Afterwards Obliged To Lose Her Again In Detail.

There Are No Rules For Felicity.

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

To Die Is Nothing; But It Is Terrible Not To Live.

I Am A Soul. I Know Well That What I Shall Render Up To The Grave Is Not Myself. That Which Is Myself Will Go Elsewhere. Earth, Thou Art Not My Abyss!

In Saying No To Progress, It Is Not The Future Which They Condemn, But Themselves. They Give Themselves A Melancholy Disease; They Inoculate Themselves With The Past. There Is But One Way Of Refusing Tomorrow, That Is To Die.

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

We Are For Religion Against The Religions.

Out Milky Way Is The Dwelling; The Nebulae Are The City.

Algebra Applies To The Clouds.

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

Since We Shall Love Each Other, I Shall Be Great And You Shall Be Rich.

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

There Are People Who Observe The Rules Of Honor As One Observes The Stars, From A Great Distance.

At The Moment When Her Eyes Closed, When All Feeling Vanished In Her, She Thought That She Felt A Touch Of Fire Imprinted On Her Lips, A Kiss More Burning Than The Red-hot Iron Of The Executioner.

Be As A Bird Perched On A Frail Branch That She Feels Bending Beneath Her, Still She Sings Away All The Same, Knowing She Has Wings.

Son, Brother, Father, Lover, Friend. There Is Room In The Heart For All The Affections, As There Is Room In Heaven For All The Stars.

On This Point, The Priest And The Philosopher Agree: We Must Die.

To Err Is Human. To Loaf Is Parisian.

History Has Its Truth, And So Has Legend. Legendary Truth Is Of Another Nature Than Historical Truth. Legendary Truth Is Invention Whose Result Is Reality. Furthermore, History And Legend Have The Same Goal; To Depict Eternal Man Beneath Momentary Man.

It Is The Peculiarity Of Grief To Bring Out The Childish Side Of Man.

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

I Repeat, Whether We Be Italians Or Frenchmen, Misery Concerns Us All.

Nothing Awakens Reminiscence Like An Aroma.

Doing Nothing Is Happiness For Children And Misery For Old Men.

My Tastes Are Aristocratic, My Actions Democratic.

The First Symptom Of True Love In A Man Is Timidity, In A Young Woman, Boldness. This Is Surprising, And Yet Nothing Is More Simple. It Is The Two Sexes Tending To Approach Each Other And Assuming Each The Other's Qualities.

One Sees Qualities At A Distance And Defects At Close Range.

...but Listen, There Will Be More Joy In Heaven Over The Tears Of A Repentant Sinner Than Over The White Robes Of A Hundred Just Men.

In Love, Such A Word, Whispered, Is A Mysterious Kiss Of The Soul To The Soul.

His Judgement Demonstrates That One Can Be A Genius And Understand Nothing Of An Art That Is Not One's Own.

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.

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.

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.

When The Heart Is Dry The Eye Is Dry.

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

Nothing Can Be More Depressing Than To Expose, Naked To The Light Of Thought, The Hideous Growth Of Argot. Indeed It Is Like A Sort Of Repellent Animal Intended To Dwell In Darkness Which Has Been Dragged Out Of Its Cloaca. One Seems To See A Horned And Living Creature Viciously Struggling To Be Restored To The Place Where It Belongs. One Word Is Like A Claw, Another Like A Sightless And Bleeding Eye; And There Are Phrases Which Clutch Like The Pincers Of A Crab. And All Of It Is Alive With The Hideous Vitality Of Things That Have Organized Themselves Amid Disorganization.

Die, Very Good, But Do Not Make Others Die. Suicides Like The One Which Is About To Take Place Here Are Sublime, But Suicide Is Restricted, And Does Not Allow Of Extension; And So Soon As It Affects Your Neighbors, Suicide Becomes Murder.

We Are Given Up To Those Gods, Those Monsters, Those Giants, — Our Thoughts.

A Queen, Devoid Of Beauty Is Not Queen; She Needs The Royalty Of Beauty's Mien.

Solitude Either Develops The Mental Power, Or Renders Men Dull And Vicious.

Do You Hear The People Sing Lost In The Valley Of The Night? It Is The Music Of A People Who Are Climbing To The Light. For The Wretched Of The Earth There Is A Flame That Never Dies. Even The Darkest Night Will End And The Sun Will Rise.

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 Future Has Several Names. For The Weak, It Is Impossible; For The Fainthearted, It Is Unknown; But For The Valiant, It Is Ideal.

A Poet Is A World Enclosed In A Man.

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.

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?

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

A Stout Heart May Be Ruined In Fortune But Not In Spirit.

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

He Who Contemplates The Depths Of Paris Is Seized With Vertigo. Nothing Is More Fantastic. Nothing Is More Tragic. Nothing Is More Sublime.

As We Have Said, Robust Souls Are Sometimes Almost, But Not Entirely, Overthrown By Strokes Of Misfortune....despair Has Steps Leading Upward. From Total Depression We Rise To Despondency, From Despondency To Affliction, From Affliction To Melancholy. Melancholy Is A Twilight State In Which Suffering Transmutes Into A Somber Joy....melancholy Is The Enjoyment Of Being Sad.

Everything Changes. The Only Thing That Remains Immovable Across The Centuries And Fixes The Character Of A People Is Cooking.

Sleep Comes More Easily Than It Returns.

Oh Lord! Open The Doors Of Night For Me So That I May Leave This Place And Disappear.

To Rove About, Musing, That Is To Say Loitering, Is, For A Philosopher, A Good Way Of Spending Time, Especially In That Kind Of Mock Rurality, Ugly But Odd, And Partaking Of Two Natures, Which Surrounds Certain Large Cities, Particularly Paris.

When, Like An Emir Of Tyrannic Power, Sirius Appears, And On The Horizon Black Bids Countless Stars Pursue Their Mighty Track.

The Hand Which Moves Over The Dial Moves Also Among Souls.

Wisdom And Eloquence Are Not Always United.

A War Between Europeans Is A Civil War.

When Grace Is Joined With Wrinkles, It Is Adorable. There Is An Unspeakable Dawn In Happy Old Age.

Positive Thinking

Marius Was Of The Temperament That Sinks Into Grief And Remains There; Cosette Was Of The Sort That Plunges In And Comes Out Again.

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

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.

Desiring Always To Be In Mourning, He Clothed Himself With Night.

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

Wonderful Nature Has A Double Meaning, Which Dazzles Great Minds And Blinds Uncultivated Souls. When Man Is Ignorant, When The Desert Is Filled With Visions, The Darkness Of Solitude Is Added To The Darkness Of Intelligence; Hence, In Man, The Possibilities Of Perdition

Excitement Is Not Enjoyment: In Calmness Lies True Pleasure. The Most Precious Wines Are Sipped, Not Bolted At A Swallow.

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.

‎"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.

The Brutalities Of Progress Are Called Revolutions. When They Are Over We Realize This: That The Human Race Has Been Roughly Handled, But That It Has Advanced.

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.

To Die For Lack Of Love Is Horrible. The Asphyxia Of The Soul.

A Sewer Is A Cynic. It Tells All.

Genius Is A Promontory Jutting Out Into The Infinite.

Every Step Which The Intelligence Of Europe Has Taken Has Been In Spite Of The Clerical Party.

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

To Introduce A New Play Only Six Weeks After Another Has Been Banned Is Also A Way To Speak One's Piece To The Government. It Proves That Art And Liberty Can Grow Back In One Night Under The Clumsy Foot Which Crushes Them.

The Death Agony Of The Barricade Was About To Begin.for, Since The Preceding Evening, The Two Rows Of Houses In The Rue De La Chanvrerie Had Become Two Walls; Ferocious Walls, Doors Closed, Windows Closed, Shutters Closed. A House Is An Escarpment, A Door Is A Refusal, A Facade Is A Wall. This Wall Hears, Sees And Will Not. It Might Open And Save You. No. This Wall Is A Judge. It Gazes At You And Condemns You. What Dismal Things Are Closed Houses.

Fame Must Have Enemies, As Light Must Have Gnats.

Sometimes He Used A Spade In His Garden, And Sometimes He Read And Wrote. He Had But One Name For These Two Kinds Of Labor; He Called Them Gardening. ‘the Spirit Is A Garden,’ Said He

I Have Examined The Death Penalty Under Each Of Its Two Aspects: As A Direct Action, And As An Indirect One. What Does It Come Down To? Nothing But Something Horrible And Useless, Nothing But A Way Of Shedding Blood That Is Called A Crime When An Individual Commits It, But Is Sadly Called "justice" When Society Brings It About. Make No Mistake, You Lawmakers And Judges, In The Eyes Of God As In Those Of Conscience, What Is A Crime When Individuals Do It Is No Less An Offense When Society Commits The Deed.

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