When you compare the sorrows of real life to the pleasures of the imaginary one, you will never want to live again, only to dream forever.

Are there not some places where we seem to breathe sadness? — why, we cannot tell. It is a chain of recollections — an idea which carries you back to other times, to other places — which, very likely, have no connection with the present time and place.

It is the way of weakened minds to see everything through a black cloud. The soul forms its own horizons; your soul is darkened, and consequently the sky of the future appears stormy and unpromising

Life is a storm, my young friend. You will bask in the sunlight one moment, be shattered on the rocks the next. What makes you a man is what you do when that storm comes.

On what slender threads do life and fortune hang.

The wretched and miserable should turn to their Saviour first, yet they do not hope in Him until all other hope is exhausted.

And now, farewell to kindness, humanity and gratitude... I have substituted myself for Providence in rewarding the good; may the God of vengeance now yield me His place to punish the wicked.