He was bored now when Emma suddenly began to sob on his breast; and his heart, like the people who can only stand a certain amount of music, became drowsy through indifference to the vibrations of a love whose subtleties he could no longer distinguish.

Beautiful things spoil nothing.

Success as I see it is a result, not a goal.

I do not like to "interest" the public with myself.

He loved a book because it was a book; he loved its odor, its form, its title. What he loved in a manuscript was its old illegible date, the bizarre and strange Gothic characters, the heavy gilding which loaded its drawings. It was its pages covered with dust — dust of which he breathed the sweet and tender perfume with delight.

Come, let’s be calm: no one incapable of restraint was ever a writer.

Only three things are infinite. The sky in its stars, the sea in its drops of water, and the heart in its tears.