The one way of tolerating existence is to lose oneself in literature as in a perpetual orgy.

One mustn't ask apple trees for oranges, France for sun, women for love, life for happiness.

The more you approach infinity, the deeper you penetrate terror

One's duty is to feel what is great, cherish the beautiful, and to not accept the conventions of society with the ignominy that it imposes upon us.

One mustn't always believe that feeling is everything. In the arts, it is nothing without form.

I hate that which we have decided to call realism, even though I have been made one of its high priests.

We think of women at every age: while still children, we fondle with a naïve sensuality the breasts of those grown-up girls kissing us and cuddling us in their arms; at the age of ten, we dream of love; at fifteen, love comes along; at sixty, it is still with us, and if dead men in their tombs have any thought in their heads, it is how to make their way underground to the nearby grave, lift the shroud of the dear departed women, and mingle with her in her sleep