It is, indeed, only in old age that intellectual men attain their sublime expression, whilst portraits of them in their youth show only the first traces of it.

Want and boredom are indeed the twin poles of human life.

The man who goes up in a balloon does not feel as if he were ascending; he only sees the earth sinking deeper below him.

No one can transcend their own individuality.

Suicide may also be regarded as an experiment - a question which man puts to Nature, trying to force her to answer. The question is this: What change will death produce in a man's existence and in his insight into the nature of things? It is a clumsy experiment to make; for it involves the destruction of the very consciousness which puts the question and awaits the answer.

Reading is merely a surrogate for thinking for yourself; it means letting someone else direct your thoughts.

The greatest intellectual capacities are only found in connection with a vehement and passionate will.