collections are amusing only in the making; afterwards they are like sporting prints without the sport. The sons of collectors inherit only the corpse of their fathers' satisfied passion.

The affairs of the royal house form a subject of conversation for those who, as a rule, would have no conversation.

The arts are good and providential in that they allow the soul to imitate the movements of love, and to feel love without its being returned - which, perhaps, is the only way of feeling it permanently.

those two wholesome defects of the French people, malice and curiosity, both of which are essential to its greatness.

Words express only the feelings we know already.

marriage was a calamity, but it was not an occupation.

One should make one's life a mosaic. Let the general design be good, the colors lively, and the materials diversified.