Can a man possessing conciousness ever really respect himself?

What is most vile and despicable about money is that it even confers talent. And it will do so until the end of the world.

...one may say anything about the history of the world - anything that might enter the most disordered imagination. The only thing one can't say is that it's rational.

One must be a great man indeed to be able to hold out even against common sense." "Or else a fool.

The pleasure of despair. But then, it is in despair that we find the most acute pleasure, especially when we are aware of the hopelessness of the situation... ...everything is a mess in which it is impossible to tell what's what, but that despite this impossibility and deception it still hurts you, and the less you can understand, the more it hurts.

He was one of the numerous and varied legion of dullards, of half-animated abortions, conceited, half-educated coxcombs, who attach themselves to the idea most in fashion only to vulgarize it and who caricature every cause they serve, however sincerely.

Civilization has made man, if not always more bloodthirsty, at least more viciously, more horribly bloodthirsty.