The bad thing about all religions is that, instead of being able to confess their allegorical nature, they have to conceal it.

Marrying means, to grasp blindfolded into a sack hoping to find out an eel out of an assembly of snakes.

Suffering by nature or chance never seems so painful as suffering inflicted on us by the arbitrary will of another.

We must set limits to our wishes, curb our desires, moderate our anger, always remembering that an individual can attain only an infinitesimal share in anything that is worth having; and that on the other hand, everyone must incur many of the ills of life

Patriotism, when it wants to make itself felt in the domain of learning, is a dirty fellow who should be thrown out of doors.

The present is the only reality and the only certainty.

Knowledge is to certain extent a second existence.