Self-interest is an inexhaustible source of convenient illusions. The number of beings who wish to see truly is extraordinarily small.

To know how to suggest is the great art of teaching. To attain it we must be able to guess what will interest; we must learn to read the childish soul as we might a piece of music. Then, by simply changing the key, we keep up the attraction and vary the song.

The ideal doctor would be a man endowed with profound knowledge of life and of the soul, intuitively divining any suffering or disorder of whatever kind, and restoring peace by his mere presence.

Every life is a profession of faith.

Sadness takes up the pen more readily than joy.

A thousand things advance; nine hundred and ninety nine retreat; That is progress.

Are we not all shipwrecked,...condemned to death?... However impatient our neighbours make us, however much indignation our race arouses, we are all bound together, and the companions of a chain-gang have everything to lose by mutual insults.