Contemplating an object fixedly with the mind, asking myself, 'What is it?' without thinking of any other object or relating it to anything else for hours on end.

In struggling against anguish one never produces serenity; the struggle against anguish only produces new forms of anguish.

The notion of obligations comes before that of rights, which is subordinate and relative to the former. A right is not effectual by itself, but only in relation to the obligation to which it corresponds.

The work of art which I do not make, none other will ever make.

Modern life is given over to immoderation. Immoderation invades everything: actions and thought, public and private life.

Truth is one, but error is manifold.

The great error of nearly all studies of war... has been to consider war as an episode in foreign policies, when it is an act of interior politics.