We do not obtain the most precious gifts by going in search of them but by waiting for them.

He who does not realize to what extent shifting fortune and necessity hold in subjection every human spirit, cannot regard as fellow-creatures nor love as he loves himself those whom chance separated from him by an abyss. The variety of constraints pressing upon man give rise to the illusion of several distinct species that cannot communicate. Only he who has measured the dominion of force, and knows how not to respect it, is capable of love and justice.

Sin is nothing else but the failure to recognize human wretchedness.

If we concentrate our attention on trying to solve a problem of geometry, and if at the end of an hour we are no nearer to doing so than at the beginning, we have nevertheless been making progress each minute of that hour in another more mysterious dimension. Without knowing or feeling it, this apparent barren affort has brought more light into the soul.

Fire destroys that which feeds it.

Nothing can have as its destination anything other than its origin. The contrary idea, the idea of progress, is poison.

We do not obtain the most precious gifts by going in search of them but by waiting for them.