The prayers of a lover are more imperious than the menaces of the whole world

Humanity is outraged in me and with me.

Charity degrades those who receive it and hardens those who dispense it.

It is sad, no doubt, to exhaust one's strength and one's days in cleaving the bosom of this jealous earth, which compels us to wring from it the treasures of its fertility, when a bit of the blackest and coarsest bread is, at the end of the day's work, the sole recompense and the sole profit attaching to so arduous a toil.

It is high time that we had lights that are not incendiary torches.

When I tried to draw near, you dissolved into air before my lips could touch you...

... the progress of the language has caused us to lose many old treasures. It is thus with all progress, and one must make the best of it.