In our corruption we perceive beauties unrevealed to ancient times.

I throw fresh seeds out. Who knows what survives?

There are women who inspire you with the desire to conquer them and to take your pleasure of them; but this one fills you only with the desire to die slowly beneath her gaze.

The Devil pulls the strings which make us dance; We find delight in the most loathsome things; Some furtherance of Hell each new day brings, And yet we feel no horror in that rank advance.

Nearly all our originality comes from the stamp that time impresses upon our sensibility.

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

From that moment onwards, our loathsome society rushed, like Narcissus, to contemplate its trivial image on a metallic plate. A form of lunacy, an extraordinary fanaticism took hold of these new sun-worshippers.