A friend loves you for your intelligence, a mistress for your charm, but your family's love is unreasoning; you were born into it and are of its flesh and blood. Nevertheless it can irritate you more than any group of people in the world.

The art of reading is in great part that of acquiring a better understanding of life from one's encounter with it in a book.

The reading of a fine book is an uninterrupted dialogue in which the book speaks and our soul replies.

A friend loves you for your intelligence, a mistress for your charm, but your family's love is unreasoning; you were born into it and are of its flesh and blood. Nevertheless it can irritate you more than any group of people in the world.

All of us, from time to time, need a plunge into freedom and novelty, after which routine and discipline will seem delightful by contrast.

People are discontent; men are troubled; and the literature is excellent.

Two human beings anchored to one another are like two ships shaken by waves; their carcases collide with one another and creak.