“I threw the pearl of my soul into a cup of wine. I went down the primrose path to the sound of flutes. I lived on honeycomb.”

“I would give my soul for that!”

“I wish i could write them down, these little coloured parables or poems that live for a moment in some cell of my brain, and then leave it to go wandering elsewhere. I hate writing; the mere act of writing a thing down is troublesome to me. I want some fine medium, and look for it in vain.”

“I drink to separate my body from my soul.”

“I want to be good. I can't bear the idea of my soul being hideous.”

“I wanted to eat of the fruit of all the trees in the garden of the world… And so, indeed, I went out, and so I lived. My only mistake was that I confined myself so exclusively to the trees of what seemed to me the sun-lit side of the garden, and shunned the other side for its shadow and its gloom.”

“I don't want to earn my living, I want to live.”