In order for once to get a glimpse of our European morality from a distance, in order to compare it with other earlier or future moralities, one must do as the traveller who wants to know the height of the towers of a city: he leaves the city.

A little wisdom is indeed possible; but this blessed security have I found in all things, that they prefer--to DANCE on the feet of chance.

This mother needs happy, reputable children, and that one needs unhappy ones: otherwise she cannot show her kindness as a mother.

To discover he is loved in return ought really to disenchant the lover with the beloved.

I love him who reserveth no share of spirit for himself, but wanteth to be wholly the spirit of his virtue: thus walketh he as spirit over the bridge.

One is healthy when one can laugh at the earnestness and zeal with which one has been hypnotized by any single detail of one's life.

Deep is the well of truth and long does it take to know what has fallen into its depths.