The fire of true enthusiasm is like the fires of Baku, which no water can ever quench, and which burn steadily on from night to day, and year to year, because their well-spring is eternal.

Women hope that the dead love may revive; but men know that of all dead things none are so past recall as a dead passion.

Dissimulation is the only thing that makes society possible; without its amenities the world would be a bear-garden.

for what is the gift of the poet and the artist except to see the sights which others cannot see and to hear the sounds that others cannot hear?

nothing is so pleasant ... as to display your worldly wisdom in epigram and dissertation, but it is a trifle tedious to hear another person display theirs.

You know the Ark of Israel and the calf of Belial were both made of gold. Religion has never yet changed the metal of her one adoration.

Could we see when and where we are to meet again, we would be more tender when we bid our friends goodbye.