Will minus intellect constitutes vulgarity.

For an author to write as he speaks is just as reprehensible as the opposite fault, to speak as he writes; for this gives a pedantic effect to what he says, and at the same time makes him hardly intelligible.

What people commonly call Fate is, as a general rule, nothing but their own stupid and foolish conduct.

A man finds himself, to his great astonishment, suddenly existing, after thousands and thousands of years of non-existence: he lives for a little while; and then, again, comes an equally long period when he must exist no more. The heart rebels against this, and feels that it cannot be true.

What a man is contributes much more to his happiness than what he has or how he is regarded by others.

Treat a work of art like a prince. Let it speak to you first.

To become reconciled to a friend with whom you have broken, is a form of weakness; and you pay the penalty of it when he takes the first opportunity of doing precisely the very thing which brought about the breach.