Passions are merely ideas in their initial stage.

Of two friends, one is always the slave of the other, although frequently neither acknowledges the fact to himself.

I have a congenital desire to contradict; my whole life is merely a chain of sad and unsuccessful contradictions to heart and mind. When faced with enthusiasm, I am seized by a midwinter freeze, and I suppose that frequent dealings with sluggish phlegmatics would have made a passionate dreamer.

Women only love those that they don’t know.

Love, like fire, goes out without fuel.

I was ready to love the whole world, but no one understood me, and I learned to hate.

It is sad to see a young man's fondest hopes and dreams shattered when the rose-colured veil is plucked away and he sees the actions and feelings of men for what they are. But he still has the hope of replacing his old illusions with others, just as fleeting, but also just as sweet.