To hold power has always meant to manipulate idiots and circumstances; and those circumstances and those idiots, tossed together, bring about those coincidences to which even the greatest men confess they owe most of their fame

Just as we descend into our consciences to judge of actions which our minds can not weigh, can we not also search in ourselves for the feeling which gives birth to forms of thought, always vague and cloudy?

We shall find in our troubled hearts, where discord reigns, two needs which seem at variance, but which merge, as I think, in a common source - the love of the true, and the love of the fabulous.

Of what use is the memory of facts, if not to serve as an example of good or of evil?

Perform your long and heavy task with energy, treading the path to which Fate has been pleased to call you.

What is a great life if not a youthful idea executed by a man of mature years.

The existence of the soldier, next to capital punishment, is the most grievous vestige of barbarism which survives among men.