I see that you believe in love such as the poets and romancers have represented... The poets represent love as the sculptors design beauty, as the musicians create melody; that is to say, endowed with an exquisite nervous organization, they gather up with discerning ardor the purest elements of life, the most beautiful lines of matter, and the most harmonious voices of nature.... To try to find in real life such love as this, eternal and absolute, is the same thing as to seek on the public squares such a woman as Venus or to expect nightingales to sing the symphonies of Beethoven.

Things they don't understand always cause a sensation among the English.

Become corrupt, corrupt, and you will cease to suffer!" This has been the cry of all cities to man.

I don't know where my road is going, but I know that I walk better when I hold your hand.

A lively retrospect summons back to us once more our youth, with vivid reflex of its early joys and unstained pleasures.

Perfection does not exist; to understand it is the triumph of human intelligence; to expect to possess it is the most dangerous kind of madness.

Look at the sun! It’s dry, it’s dead, it needs a drink, it wants blood! And I’ll give it blood!