Too much improvisation leaves the mind stupidly void.

Those who do not weep, do not see.

It is often necessary to know how to obey a woman in order sometimes to have the right to command her.

I have examined the death penalty under each of its two aspects: as a direct action, and as an indirect one. What does it come down to? Nothing but something horrible and useless, nothing but a way of shedding blood that is called a crime when an individual commits it, but is sadly called "justice" when society brings it about. Make no mistake, you lawmakers and judges, in the eyes of God as in those of conscience, what is a crime when individuals do it is no less an offense when society commits the deed.

The eye of a man should be still more reverent before the rising of a young maiden than before the rising of a star. The possibility of touch should increase respect. The down of the peach, the dust of the plum, the radiated crystal of snow, the butterfly’s wing powdered with feathers, are gross things beside that chastity that does not even know it is chaste. The young maiden is only the glimmer of a dream and is not yet statue. Her alcove is hidden in the shadows of the ideal. The indiscreet touch of the eye desecrates this dim penumbra. Here, to gaze, is to profane.

We are reassured almost as foolishly as we are alarmed; human nature is so constituted.

To love or have loved is all-sufficing. We must not ask for more. No other pearl is to be found in the shadowfolds of life. To love is an accomplishment.