To read a poem in January is as lovely as to go for a walk in June

Perhaps its inevitable, perhaps one has to choose between being nothing at all and impersonating what one is.

At times discreetly, at times disgustingly, I yielded to the most fatal temptation whenever I could no longer bear it: as a result of impatience, Orpheus lost Eurydice; as a result of impatience, I lost myself.

You are -- your life, and nothing else.

Every human endeavor, however singular it seems, involves the whole human race.

Who can exhaust a man? Who knows a man's resources?

It's just what people do when they're getting old, when they're sick of themselves and their life; they think of money and take care of themselves.