A really sublime moment is that when the last ray of light breaks in upon the soul, and marshals into a single group all the scattered disconnected truths there. There is such a vast difference between the moment which follows, and the moment which precedes this one, between what we were before, and what we are after, that the word grace has been invented to convey the idea of this magic stroke, of this light from on high.

Man forms himself in his own interior, and nowhere else.

Real excellence and humility are not incompatible one with the other, on the contrary they are twin sisters.

The Church had the words reason and liberty on her lips when the inalienable rights of the human race were threatened with shipwreck.

Nothing is achieved without solitude.

The universe shows us the life of God, or rather it is in itself the life of God. We behold in it his permanent action, the scene upon which his power is exercised, and in which all his attributes are reflected. God is not out of the universe any more than the universe is out of God. God is the principle, the universe is the consequence, but a necessary consequence, without which the principle would be inert, unfruitful, impossible to conceive.

As to the lawful pleasures of the mind, the heart, or the senses, indulge in them with gratitude and moderation, drawing up sometimes in order to punish yourself, without waiting to be forced to do so by necessity.