To the very last, he [Napoleon] had a kind of idea; that, namely, of la carrière ouverte aux talents, - the tools to him that can handle them.

I would jump down Etna for any public good - but I hate a mawkish popularity.

The excellency of every art is its intensity, capable of making all disagreeable evaporate.

I equally dislike the favor of the public with the love of a woman - they are both a cloying treacle to the wings of independence.

... Who alive can say 'Thou art no Poet - mayst not tell thy dreams'? Since every man whose soul is not a clod Hath visions, and would speak, if he had loved, And been well nurtured in his mother tongue.

Some say the world is a vale of tears, I say it is a place of soul-making.

I have so much of you in my heart.