Like a great poet, Nature knows how to produce the greatest effects with the most limited means.

I live, which is the main point.

Society is a republic. When an individual endeavors to lift himself above his fellows, he is dragged down by the mass, either by means of ridicule or of calumny. No one shall be more virtuous or more intellectually gifted than others. Whoever, by the irresistable force of genius, rises above the common herd is certain to be ostracized by society, which will pursue him with such merciless derision and detraction that at last he will be compelled to retreat into the solitude of his thoughts.

Oh what lies there are in kisses! And their guile so well prepared! Sweet the snaring is; but this is Sweeter still, to be ensnared.

But a day must come when the fire of youth will be quenched in my veins, when winter will dwell in my heart, when his snow flakes will whiten my locks, and his mists will dim my eyes. Then my friends will lie in their lonely grave, and I alone will remain like a solitary stalk forgotten by the reaper.

While we are indifferent to our good qualities, we keep on deceiving ourselves in regard to our faults, until we come to look on them as virtues.

I consider it a degradation and a stain on my honor to submit to baptism in order to qualify myself for state employment in Prussia.