But we never get back our youth… The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passions of which we were too much afraid, and the exquisite temptations that we had not the courage to yield to.

The happiness of a married man depends on the people he has not married.

The truth about the life of a man is not what he does, but the legend which he creates around himself.

Far away beyond the pine-woods,' he answered, in a low dreamy voice, 'there is a little garden. There the grass grows long and deep, there are the great white stars of the hemlock flower, there the nightingale sings all night long. All night long he sings, and the cold, crystal moon looks down, and the yew-tree spreads out its giant arms over the sleepers.

I must remember that a good friend is a new world.

An artist should create beautiful things, but should put nothing of his own life into them.

Authority is quite degrading.