A real writer can be recognized by the fact he doesn't find words. Therefore he must search for them and while doing that, he finds better ones.

We are wont to condemn self-love; but what we really mean to condemn is contrary to self-love. It is that mixture of selfishness and self-hate that permanently pursues us, that prevents us from loving others, and that prohibits us from losing ourselves.

It seems to me that the soul, when alone with itself and speaking to itself, uses only a small number of words, none of them extraordinary.

It is a law of nature that we defend ourselves from one affection only by means of another.

My poems mean what people take them to mean.

Nothing is more natural than mutual misunderstanding; the contrary is always surprising. I believe that one never agrees on anything except by mistake, and that all harmony among human beings is the happy fruit of an error.

Poe is the only impeccable writer. He was never mistaken.