There are no principles; there are only events. There is no good and bad, there are only circumstances.

A woman filled with faith in the one she loves is the creation of a novelist's imagination.

The secret of the nobility and beauty of great ladies lies in the art with which they can shed their veils. In such situations, they become like ancient statues. If they kept the merest scarf on, they would be lewd. Your bourgeois woman will always try to cover her nakedness.

How fondly swindlers coddle their dupes! No mother is as caressing or thoughtful towards her adored child as a merchant in hypocrisy toward his milch-cow.

Our heart is a treasury; if you pour out all its wealth at once, you are bankrupt.

Hope is a memory that desires, the memory is a memory that has enjoyed.

Love is a religion, and its rituals cost more than those of other religions. It goes by quickly and, like a street urchin, it likes to mark its passage by a trail of devastation.