Those sweetly smiling angels with pensive looks, innocent faces, and cash-boxes for hearts.

The innocence of virgins is like milk which turns when exposed to a clap of thunder, to a tart smell, to a hot day, to the merest nothing.

Misfortune makes of certain souls a vast desert through which rings the voice of God.

Glory and fame mean twelve thousand francs' worth of paid articles in the newspapers and five thousand crowns' worth of dinners.

Women? In order to realize how far these charming creatures we idealize can carry their cruelty, we must see them among themselves!

Rich men are resolved to be astonished at nothing. When they see a masterpiece, they must needs at one glance recognize some flaw to dispense them from admiration, a vulgar emotion.

Heaven should be kind to stupid people, for no one else can be consistently.