“Nature makes only dumb animals. We owe the fools to society.”

“Passion is born deaf and dumb.”

“No one ought even to desert a woman after throwing her a heap of gold in her distress! He ought to love her forever! You are young, only twenty-one, and kind and upright and fine. You'll ask me how a woman can take money from a man. Oh, God, isn't it natural to share everything with the one we owe all our happiness to? When one has given everything, how can one quibble about a mere portion of it? Money is important only when feeling has ceased. Isn't one bound for life? How can you foresee separation when you think someone loves you? When a man swears eternal love--how can there be any separate concerns in that case?”

“Perhaps it is only human nature to inflict suffering on anything that will endure suffering, whether by reason of its genuine humility, or indifference, or sheer helplessness.”

“We flew back home like swallows. 'Is it happiness that makes us so light?' Agathe asked.”

“I yield to your wishes. It is the privilege of the women whom we love more than they love us to make the men who love them ignore the ordinary rules of common-sense.”

“Women are always true, even in the midst of their greatest falsities, because they are always influenced by some natural feeling.”