To have a true idea of man or of life, one must have stood himself on the brink of suicide, or on the door-sill of insanity, at least once.

The production of a work of art is determined by the material and intellectual climate in which a man lives and dies.

I wish to reproduce things as they are or as they would be even if I myself did not exist.

The search for causes must come after the collection of facts.

A fixed idea is like the iron rod which sculptors put in their statues. It impales and sustains.

I've met many thinkers and many cats, but the wisdom of cats is infinitely superior.

Change a virtue in its circumstances find it becomes a vice; change a vice in its circumstances, and it becomes a virtue. Regard the same quality from two sides; on one it is a fault, on the other a merit. The essential of a man is found concealed far below these moral badges.