The amateur is very rare in French literature - as rare as he is common in our own.

Discretion is not the better part of biography.

In pure literature, the writers of the eighteenth century achieved, indeed, many triumphs; but their great, their peculiar, triumphs were in the domain of thought.

How far the existence of the Academy has influenced French literature, either for good or for evil, is an extremely dubious question.

Unlike the majority of the writers of his age, La Rochefoucauld was an aristocrat; and this fact gives a peculiar tone to his work.

In the literature of France Moliere occupies the same kind of position as Cervantes in that of Spain, Dante in that of Italy, and Shakespeare in that of England. His glory is more than national - it is universal.

With a very few exceptions, every word in the French vocabulary comes straight from the Latin.