Scent is the soul of flowers, and sea flowers, as splendid as they may be, have no soul!

Poets are like proverbs: you can always find one to contradict another.

We now know most things that can be measured in this world, except the bounds of human ambition!

Better to put things at the worst at first and reserve the best for a surprise.

The moon, by her comparative proximity, and the constantly varying appearances produced by her several phases, has always occupied a considerable share of the attention of the inhabitants of the earth.

When I returned to partial life my face was wet with tears. How long that state of insensibility had lasted I cannot say. I had no means now of taking account of time. Never was solitude equal to this, never had any living being been so utterly forsaken.

Science, my lad, is made up of mistakes, but they are mistakes which it is useful to make, because they lead little by little to the truth.