Chance arrives unannounced. It emerges, and when it leaves, we are lucky if the changes it has produced are only external.

The present is never poetic as it serves necessity, necessity, however, is prosaic.

Why I love the ancients so much? Aside from everything else, when I read them, the entire past between them and me unfolds at thesame time. The hearts of how many heroes and poets may have been set on fire by Plutarch's biographies which now inspire me with their own and with borrowed flames!

Gold is the gift of vanity and common pride, but flowers are the gift of love and friendship.

The main reason why men and women make different aesthetic judgments is the fact that the latter, generally incapable of abstraction, only admire what meets their complete approval.

Mozart starved, but you allow Thalberg and Liszt make tons of gold: Of course, you may think that someone immortal cannot die of hunger

Even with limited intelligence, knowing oneself is not as difficult as some say, but to act according to what one has realized about oneself in real life is as difficult as practicing anything else, compared to theory.