“Politics is the only field in which the character of a person does not stand in the way of his career.”

“He took no interest in politics, which ruin the character and career, yet nothing can be achieved without them.”

“Error can point the way to truth, while empty-headedness can only lead to more empty-headedness or to a career in politics.”

“The claim to equality, outside of the strictly political field, is made only by those who feel themselves to be in some way inferior.”

“The work of an intellectual is not to mould the political will of others; it is, through the analyses that he does in his own field, to re-examine evidence and assumptions, to shake up habitual ways of working and thinking, to dissipate conventional familiarities, to re-evaluate rules and institutions and to participate in the formation of a political will (where he has his role as citizen to play).”

“Which of us has not felt that the character we are reading in the printed page is more real than the person standing beside us?”