In matters of the heart, nothing is true except the improbable.

What matters in a character is not whether one holds this or that opinion: what matters is how proudly one upholds it.

Innocence in genius, and candor in power, are both noble qualities.

[Moralistic] novels are at the same disadvantage as teachers: children never believe them, because they make everything that happens relate to the lesson at hand.

It seems to me that we become more dear one to the other, in together admiring works of art, which speak to the soul by their true grandeur.

If one hour's work is enough to govern France, four minutes is all that is needed for Italy. There is no nation more easily frightened; even its poetic imagination predisposes it to fear, and they look upon power as on an image that fills them with terror.

Happiness is a wondrous commodity: the more you give, the more you have.