There is in this world in which everything wears out, everything perishes, one thing that crumbles into dust, that destroys itself still more completely, leaving behind still fewer traces of itself than Beauty: namely Grief.

It is up to my spirit to find the truth. But how? Grave uncertainty, each time the spirit feels beyond its own comprehension; whenit, the explorer, is altogether to obscure land that it must search and where all its baggage is of no use. To search? That is not all: to create.

No sooner had the warm liquid mixed with the crumbs touched my palate than a shudder ran through me and I stopped, intent upon the extraordinary thing that was happening to me.

Just as those who practice the same profession recognize each other instinctively, so do those who practice the same vice.

Unkind people imagine themselves to be inflicting pain on someone equally unkind.

The stellar universe is not so difficult to understand as the real actions of other people, especially of the people with whom we are in love.

I blame the newspapers because every day they call our attention to insignificant things, while three or four times in our lives,we read books that contain essential things. Once we feverishly tear the band of paper enclosing our newspapers, things should change and we should find--I do not know--the Pensées by Pascal!