An experience teaches only the good observer; but far from seeking a lesson in it, everyone looks for an argument in experience, and everyone interprets the conclusion in his own way.

How much more sensuality invites to art than does sentimentality.

Whoever starts out toward the unknown must consent to venture alone.

It is unthinkable for a Frenchman to arrive at middle age without having syphilis and the Cross of the Legion of Honor.

What would there be in a story of happiness? Only what prepares it, only what destroys it can be told.

The anxiety we have for the figure we cut, for our personage, is constantly cropping out. We are showing off and are often more concerned with making a display than with living. Whoever feels observed observes himself.

Most quarrels amplify a misunderstanding.