We are pantheists as natural scientists, polytheists as poets, and monotheists as moral beings.

He is happy as well as great who needs neither to obey nor to command in order to be something.

Rejoice that you have still have a long time to live, before the thought comes to you that there is nothing more in the world to see.

It seems to me that every phenomenon, every fact, itself is the really interesting object. Whoever explains it, or connects it with other events, usually only amuses himself or makes sport of us, as, for instance, the naturalist or historian. But a single action or event is interesting, not because it is explainable, but because it is true.

What I possess I would gladly retain. Change amuses the mind, yet scarcely profits.

To have seen Italy without having seen Sicily is to not have seen Italy at all, for Sicily is the clue to everything.

Wherever a man may happen to turn, whatever a man may undertake, he will always end up by returning to that path which nature has marked out for him.