I have described religion as the metaphysics of the people.

The man who sees two or three generations is like one who sits in the conjuror's booth at a fair, and sees the same tricks two or three times. They are meant to be seen only once.

When a man has reached a condition in which he believes that a thing must happen because he does not wish it, and that what he wishes to happen never will be, this is really the state called desperation.

[T]he appropriate form of address between man and man ought to be, not monsieur, sir, but fellow sufferer, compagnon de miseres.

Something of great importance now past is inferior to something of little importance now present, in that the latter is a reality, and related to the former as something to nothing.

Writers may be classified as meteors, planets, and fixed stars.

To use many words to communicate few thoughts is everywhere the unmistakable sign of mediocrity. To gather much thought into few words stamps the man of genius.