There's a bit of testicle at the bottom of our most sublime feelings and our purest tenderness.

How easy it is to tell tales!

What is a monster? A being whose survival is incompatible with the existing order.

There is less harm to be suffered in being mad among madmen than in being sane all by oneself.

To be born in imbecility, in the midst of pain and crisis; to be the plaything of ignorance, error, need, sickness, wickedness, and passions; to return step by step to imbecility, from the time of lisping to that of doting; to live among knaves and charlatans of all kinds; to die between one man who takes your pulse and another who troubles your head; never to know where you come from, why you come and where you are going! That is what is called the most important gift of our parents and nature. Life.

A thing is not proved just because no one has ever questioned it. What has never been gone into impartially has never been properly gone into. Hence scepticism is the first step toward truth. It must be applied generally, because it is the touchstone.

First move me, astonish me, break my heart, let me tremble, weep, stare, be enraged-only then regale my eyes.