A letter is a soul, so faithful an echo of the speaking voice that to the sensitive it is among the richest treasures of love.

Love is not only a feeling, it is also an art. A simple word, a sensitive precaution, a mere nothing reveal to a woman the sublime artist who can touch her heart without withering it.

In the first woman we love, we love everything. Growing older, we love the woman only.

A rent in your clothes is a mishap, a stain on them is a vice.

No woman has ever existed who did not know perfectly well in her heart what to expect from the superiority or inferiority of a rival.

Conscience is a cudgel which all men pick up in order to thwack their neighbors instead of applying it to their own shoulders.

The best painters, as they progress in reputation and towards perfection, are found to dispense more and more with the technique of the art, for simpler methods. Simplicity never fails to charm.