Life is a hospital in which every patient is possessed by a desire to change his bed.

Finer than any sand are dusts of gold that gleam, Vague starpoints, in the mystic iris of their eyes.

It is necessary to work, if not from inclination, at least from despair. Everything considered, work is less boring than amusing oneself.

Woman is natural, that is to say, abominable.

Genius is nothing more nor less than childhood recaptured at will.

Poetry has no goal other than itself; it can have no other, and no poem will be so great, so noble, so truly worthy of the name of poem, than one written uniquely for the pleasure of writing a poem.

In literature as in ethics, there is danger, as well as glory, in being subtle. Aristocracy isolates us.