What a mysterious faculty is that queen of the faculties!

Those men get along best with women who can get along best without them.

The idea of beauty which man creates for himself imprints itself on his whole attire, crumples or stiffens his dress, rounds off or squares his gesture, and in the long run even ends by subtly penetrating the very features of his face. Man ends by looking like his ideal self. These engravings can be translated either into beauty or ugliness; in one direction, they become caricatures, in the other, antique statues.

It is from the womb of art that criticism was born.

Nature... is nothing but the inner voice of self-interest.

Nations, like families, have great men only in spite of themselves. They do everything in their power not to have any. And therefore, the great man, in order to exist, must possess a force of attack which is greater than the force of resistance developed by millions of people.

To be a great man and a saint to oneself, that's the only important thing.