The historian must be a poet; not to find, but to find again; not to breathe life into beings, into imaginary deeds, but in order to re-animate and revive that which has been; to represent what time and space have placed at a distance from us.

There is a slowness in affairs which ripens them, and a slowness which rots them.

At first we hope too much and later on, not enough.

Everything that is exquisite hides itself.

The egoist does not tolerate egoism.

Like those statues which must be made larger than "nature" in order that, viewed from below, or from a distance, they may appear to be of the "natural" size, certain truths must be "strained" in order that the public may form a just idea of them.

There are people who laugh to show their fine teeth; and there are those who cry to show their good hearts.