I have supported my deviations with reasons; I did not stop at mere doubt; I have vanquished, I have uprooted, I have destroyed everything in my heart that might have interfered with my pleasure.

We are no guiltier in following the primative impulses that govern us than is the Nile for her floods or the sea for her waves.

The imagination is the spur of delights... all depends upon it, it is the mainspring of everything; now, is it not by means of the imagination one knows joy? Is it not of the imagination that the sharpest pleasures arise?

Certain souls may seem harsh to others, but it is just a way, beknownst only to them, of caring and feeling more deeply.

All universal moral principles are idle fancies.

It is always by way of pain one arrives at pleasure.

Religions are the cradles of despotism.