There is no escaping, at times, the gloomy suspicion that fiddling with pens and ink is, after all, no fit employment for a grown man.

There is not any memory with less satisfaction than the memory of some temptation we resisted.

At all events, I do not mean to leave it unaltered.

I am Manuel. I have lived in the loneliness which is common to all men, but the difference is that I have known it. Now it is necessary for me, as it is necessary for all men, to die in this same loneliness, and I know that there is no help for it.

The desire to write perfectly of beautiful happenings is, as the saying runs, old as the hills — and as immortal.

Good and evil keep very exact accounts... and the face of every man is their ledger.

In what else, pray, does man differ from the other animals except in that he is used by words?