If children were brought into the world by an act of pure reason alone, would the human race continue to exist? Would not a man rather have so much sympathy with the coming generation as to spare it the burden of existence, or at any rate not take it upon himself to impose that burden upon it in cold blood?

Scoundrels are always sociable.

You are free to do what you want, but you are not free to want what you want.

You must treat a work of art like a great man: stand before it and wait patiently till it deigns to speak.

Genius is its own reward; for the best that one is, one must necessarily be for oneself. . . . Further, genius consists in the working of the free intellect., and as a consequence the productions of genius serve no useful purpose. The work of genius may be music, philosophy, painting, or poetry; it is nothing for use or profit. To be useless and unprofitable is one of the characteristics of genius; it is their patent of nobility.

Not to go to the theater is like making one's toilet without a mirror.

It is the courage to make a clean breast of it in the face of every question that makes the philosopher.