But the French writers always had more originality and independence than others, and that regulator, which elsewhere was religion, long since ceased to exist for them.

If the infinity of the sea may call out thus, perhaps when a man is growing old, calls come to him, too, from another infinity still darker and more deeply mysterious; and the more he is wearied by life the dearer are those calls to him.

He always smiles, even when contemplating nothing good.

The sky is one whole, the water another; and between those two infinities the soul of man is in loneliness.

England is never in a hurry because she is eternal.

There is probably no greater idler than myself. And I would consider myself a lazy-bones if I did not write so many volumes, and if I did not admire my diligence once I begin writing.

This homage has been rendered not to me - for the Polish soil is fertile and does not lack better writers than me - but to the Polish achievement, the Polish genius.