The value of many men and books rests solely on their faculty for compelling all to seek out the most hidden and intimate things.

What is wrong with Christianity is that it refrains from doing all those things that Christ commanded should be done.

When we dream about those who are long since forgotten or dead, it is a sign that we have undergone a radical transformation and that the ground on which we live has been completely dug up: then the dead rise up, and our antiquity becomes modernity.

Some mothers need happy children; others need unhappy ones-otherwise they cannot prove their maternal virtues.

There is not enough love and goodness in the world to permit giving any of it away to imaginary beings.

The bite of conscience, like the bite of a dog into a stone, is a stupidity.

It is a prejudice to think that morality is more favourable to the development of reason than immorality.