“To be an ignorant man, to posses nothing but a fragile word, to find oneself as if relying upon darkness and nothingness: that is the position from which one must be constantly setting out.”

“Though they may not always be handsome men doomed to evil posses the manly virtues.”

“one should always talk well about oneself! The word spreads around and in the end, noone remembers where it started”

“And there he lay in his bed, a broken man, worn out by a way of life which had been thrust upon him because of the antics of a wayward pig.”

“A man must dream a long time in order to act with grandeur, and dreaming is nursed in darkness.”

“In two weeks, despite these notes, I shall no longer believe in what I am experiencing now. One must leave behind a trace of this journey which memory forgets. One must, when this is impossible, write or draw without responding to the romantic solicitations of pain, without enjoying suffering like music, tieing a pen to one's foot if need be, helping the doctors who can learn nothing from laziness.”

“Man can will nothing unless he has first understood that he must count on no one but himself; that he is alone, abandoned on earth in the midst of his infinite responsibilities, without help, with no other aim than the one he sets himself, with no other destiny than the one he forges for himself on this earth.”