Without duty, life is sort of boneless; it cannot hold itself together.

The dregs may stir themselves as they please; they fall back to the bottom by their own coarseness.

Poetry is to be found nowhere unless we carry it within us.

To be an agreeable guest one need only enjoy oneself.

I quit Paris unwillingly, because I must part from my friends; and I quit the country unwillingly, because I must part from myself.

Religion must be loved as a kind of country and nursing-mother. It was religion that nourished our virtues, that showed us heaven, that taught us to walk in the path of duty.

The God of metaphysics is but an idea. But the God of religion, the Maker of heaven and earth, the sovereign Judge of actions and thoughts, is a power.