People don't like the true and simple; they like fairy tales and humbug.

Any man who does not see everything in terms of self, that is to say who wants to be something in respect of other men, to do good to them or simply give them something to do, is unhappy, disconsolate, and accursed.

One of the proud joys of the man of letters - if that man of letters is an artist - is to feel within himself the power to immortalize at will anything he chooses to immortalize. Insignificant though he may be, he is conscious of possessing a creative divinity. God creates lives; the man of imagination creates fictional lives which may make a profound and as it were more living impression on the world's memory.

Princes enjoy themselves like children in the company of ordinary human beings.

As a general truth, it is safe to say that any picture that produces a moral impression is a bad picture.

The English are crooked as a nation and honest as individuals. The contrary is true of the French, who are honest as a nation and crooked as individuals.

If there is a God, atheism must seem to Him as less of an insult than religion.