“Nothing is so easy as to deceive one’s self when one does not lack wit and is familiar with all the niceties of language. Language is a prostitute queen who descends and rises to all roles. Disguises herself, arrays herself in fine apparel, hides her head and effaces herself; an advocate who has an answer for everything, who has always foreseen everything, and who assumes a thousand forms in order to be right. The most honorable of men is he who thinks best and acts best, but the most powerful is he who is best able to talk and write”

“The most honest of men is the one who thinks and acts best, but the most powerful is the one who writes and speaks best.”

“No place is ugly to those who understand the virtues and sweetness of everything that God has made.”

“He who draws noble delights from sentiments of poetry is a true poet, though he has never written a line in all his life.”

“I'm beginning to believe that there are angels disguised as men who pass themselves off as such and who inhabit the earth for a while to console and lift up with them toward heaven the poor, exhausted and saddened souls who were ready to perish here below.”

“God abandons only those who abandon themselves, and whoever has the courage to shut up his sorrow within his own heart is stronger to fight against it than he who complains.”

“There are no more thorough prudes than those who have some little secret to hide.”