Among the Diaries beginning with the second quarter of our century, there is frequent mention of a lady then becoming famous for her beauty and her wit: "an unusual combination," in the deliberate syllables of one of the writers, who is, however, not disposed to personal irony when speaking of her.

Earth knows no desolation. She smells regeneration in the moist breath of decay.

The future not being born, my friend, we will abstain from baptizing it.

We are betrayed by what is false within

A house with a great wine stored below lives in our imagination as a joyful house, fast and splendidly rooted in the soil.

My religion of life is always to be cheerful.

The man of science is nothing if not a poet gone wrong.