One is always wrong to open a conversation with the devil, for, however he goes about it, he always insists upon having the last word.

We should enjoy this summer, flower by flower, as if it were to be the last one we’ll see.

The greatest intelligence is precisely the one that suffers the most from its own limitations.

Never have I been able to settle in life. Always seated askew, as if on the arm of a chair; ready to get up, to leave.

There are very few monsters who warrant the fear we have of them.

To know how to free oneself is nothing; the arduous thing is to know what to do with one's freedom.

Humanity cherishes its swaddling clothes; but it shall not grow up unless it can free itself from them. Turning down his mother's breast does not make the weaned child ungrateful. ... Rise up naked, valiant; make the sheaths crack; push aside the stakes; to grow straight you need no more than the thrust of your sap and the call of the sun.