Every time a new nation, America or Russia for instance, advances toward civilization, the human race perfects itself; every time an inferior class emerges from enslavement and degradation, the human race again perfects itself.

Divine Wisdom, intending to detain us some time on earth, has done well to cover with a veil the prospect of the life to come; for if our sight could clearly distinguish the opposite bank, who would remain on this tempestuous coast of time?

I desire no other proof of Christianity than the Lord's Prayer.

The sense of this word among the Greeks affords the noblest definition of it; enthusiasm signifies 'God in us.'

We understand death only after it has placed its hands on someone we love.

[Ridicule] laughs at all those who see the earnestness of life and who still believe in true feelings and in serious thought ... It soils the hope of youth. Only shameless vice is above its reach.

... in the history of the human mind there has never been a useful thought or a profound truth that has not found its century and admirers.