In what concerns you much, do not think that you have companions: know that you are alone in the world.

Our manners have been corrupted by communication with the saints. Our hymn-books resound with a melodious cursing of God and enduring Him forever. One would say that even the prophets and redeemers had rather consoled the fears than confirmed the hopes of man. There is nowhere recorded a simple and irrepressible satisfaction with the gift of life, any memorable praise of God.

The world laughs in flowers.

You cannot receive a shock unless you have an electric affinity for that which shocks you.

For things to change, we must change.

If you would be chaste, you must be temperate.

I found in myself, and still find, an instinct toward a higher, or, as it is named, spiritual life, as do most men, and another toward a primitive rank and savage one, and I reverence them both. I love the wild not less than the good.