And if you can't shape your life the way you want, at least try as much as you can not to degrade it.

A month passes by and brings another month. Easy to guess what lies ahead: all of yesterday's boredom. And tomorrow ends up no longer like tomorrow.

When you set out on your journey to Ithaca, pray that the road is long, full of adventure, full of knowledge.

Give me artificial flowers - porcelain and metal glories - neither fading nor decaying, forms unaging. Flowers of the splendid gardens of another place, where Forms and Styles and Knowledge dwell. I love flowers made of glass or gold, true Art's true gifts, their painted hues more beautiful than nature's, worked in nacre and enamel, with perfect leaves and branches.

What shall become of us without any barbarians? Those people were a kind of solution.

Roses by the head, jasmine at the feet so appear the longings that have passed without being satisfied, not one of them granted a night of sensual pleasure, or one of its radiant mornings.

If you are one of the truly elect, be careful how you attain your eminence.