“Non, Thérèse, non, il n’est point de Dieu, la nature se suffit à elle-même ; elle n’a nullement besoin d’un auteur, cet auteur supposé n’est qu’une décomposition de ses propres forces”

“Você diz que minha maneira de pensar não pode ser aprovada. O que me importa? Bem louco é quem adota a maneira de pensar dos outros! Ela é fruto das minhas reflexões, deve-se á minha existência, à minha organização; não sou senhor de mudá-la, e, se fosse, não o faria. Essa maneira de pensar que você reprova é o único consolo de minha vida. Não foi a minha maneira de pensar que me desgraçou. O homem sensato que despreza o preconceito dos tolos necessariamente torna-se inimigo dos tolos; que se fie disto e caçoe destes. Um viajante segue numa bela estrada por onde espalharam armadilhas; cai numa delas. A quem a culpa, ao viajante ou ao celerado que as armou? Logo, se, como você diz, colocam minha liberdade a preço do sacrifício de meus princípios ou gostos, podemos nos dizer um eterno adeus, pois antes deles, sacrificaria mil vidas e mil liberdades se as tivesse. Taís princípios e gostos são levados por mim ao fanatismo, e éobra das perseguições dos meus tiranos. Quanto mais me atormentarem, mais enraizarão meus princípios no peito. E declaro abertamente jamais ser necessário me falarem de liberdade, se esta só me for oferecida pelo preço da destruição de meus princípios. Nem diante do cadafalso mudaria de idéia.”

“Oh, there are plenty of people," the Duc used to observe, "who never misbehave save when passion spurs them to ill; later, the fire gone out of them, their now calm spirit peacefully returns to the path of virtue and, thus passing their life going from strife to error and from error to remorse, they end their days in such a way there is no telling just what roles they have enacted on earth. Such persons," he would continue, "must surely be miserable: forever drifting, continually undecided, their entire life is spent detesting in the morning what they did the evening before. Certain to repent of the pleasures they taste, they take their delight in quaking, in such sort they become at once virtuous in crime and criminal in virtue.”

“I've already told you: the only way to a woman's heart is along the path of torment. I know none other as sure.”

“Having proven that solitary pleasures are as delicious as any others and much more likely to delight, it becomes perfectly clear that this enjoyment, taken in independence of the objectwe employ, is not merely of a nature very remote from what could be pleasurable to thatobject, but is even found to be inimical to that object’s pleasure: what is more, it may becomean imposed suffering, a vexation, or a torture, and the only thing that results from this abuse isa very certain increase of pleasure for the despot who does the tormenting or vexing; let usattempt to demonstrate this.”Voluptuous emotion is nothing but a kind of vibration produced in our soul by shockswhich the imagination, inflamed by the remembrance of a lubricious object, registers uponour senses, either through this object’s presence, or better still by this object’s being exposedto that particular kind of irritation which most profoundly stirs us; thus, our voluptuoustransport Ä this indescribable convulsive needling which drives us wild, which lifts us to thehighest pitch of happiness at which man is able to arrive Ä is never ignited save by twocauses: either by the perception in the object we use of a real or imaginary beauty, the beautyin which we delight the most, or by the sight of that object undergoing the strongest possiblesensation; now, there is no more lively sensation than that of pain; its impressions are certainand dependable, they never deceive as may those of the pleasure women perpetually feign andalmost never experience; and, furthermore, how much self-confidence, youth, vigor, healthare not needed in order to be sure of producing this dubious and hardly very satisfyingimpression of pleasure in a woman. To produce the painful impression, on the contrary,requires no virtues at all: the more defects a man may have, the older he is, the less lovable,the more resounding his success. With what regards the objective, it will be far more certainlyattained since we are establishing the fact that one never better touches, I wish to say, that onenever better irritates one’s senses than when the greatest possible impression has been produced in the employed object, by no matter what devices; therefore, he who will cause themost tumultuous impression to be born in a woman, he who will most thoroughly convulsethis woman’s entire frame, very decidedly will have managed to procure himself the heaviest possible dose of voluptuousness, because the shock resultant upon us by the impressionsothers experience, which shock in turn is necessitated by the impression we have of thoseothers, will necessarily be more vigorous if the impression these others receive be painful,than if the impression they receive be sweet and mild; and it follows that the voluptuousegoist, who is persuaded his pleasures will be keen only insofar as they are entire, willtherefore impose, when he has it in his power to do so, the strongest possible dose of painupon the employed object, fully certain that what by way of voluptuous pleasure he extractswill be his only by dint of the very lively impression he has produced.”

“Can we become other than what we are?”

“Elle aurait aimé, si l’orgueilPareil à la lampe inutileQu’on allume près d’un cercueil,N’eût veillé sur son coeur stérile.Elle est morte, et n’a point vécu.Elle faisait semblant de vivre.De ses mains est tombé le livre,Dans lequel elle n’a rien lu.”