To know oneself, one should assert oneself.

What’s true of all the evils in the world is true of plague as well. It helps men to rise above themselves.

Great feelings take with them their own universe, splendid or abject. They light up with their passion an exclusive world in which they recognize their climate.

In that daily effort in which intelligence and passion mingle and delight each other, the absurd man discovers a discipline that will make up the greatest of his strengths. The required diligence and doggedness and lucidity thus resemble the conqueror's attitude. To create is likewise to give a shape to one's fate. For all these characters, their work defines them at least as much as it is defined by them. The actor taught us this: There is no frontier between being and appearing.

Intelligence in chains loses in lucidity what it gains in intensity.

It's a kind of spiritual snobbery that makes people think they can be happy without money.

We can't do without dominating others or being served.... The essential thing, in sum, is being able to get angry without the other person being able to answer back.