One must work, if not from inclination, at least out of despair — since it proves, on close examination, that work is less boring than amusing oneself.

The immense appetite we have for biography comes from a deep-seated sense of equality.

He who looks through an open window sees fewer things than he who looks through a closed window.

The more a man cultivates the arts the less he fornicates. A more and more apparent cleavage occurs between the spirit and the brute.

All the visible universe is nothing but a shop of images and signs.

...an industry which can furnish results identical to nature must be the absolute in art.

The study of beauty is a duel in which the artist cries out in terror before he is defeated.