As a means of contrast with the sublime, the grotesque is, in our view, the richest source that nature can offer.

I would rather be the head of a fly than the tail of a lion.

A smile is the same as sunshine; it banishes winter from the human countenance.

The most ferocious animals are disarmed by caresses to their young.

Progress is the stride of God.

Have no fear of robbers or murderers. They are external dangers, petty dangers. We should fear ourselves. Prejudices are the real robbers; vices the real murderers. The great dangers are within us. Why worry about what threatens our heads or our purses? Let us think instead of what threatens our souls.

The merciful precepts of Christ will at last suffuse the Code and it will glow with their radiance. Crime will be considered an illness with its own doctors to replace your judges and its hospitals to replace your prisons. Liberty shall be equated with health. Ointments and oil shall be applied to limbs that were once shackled and branded. Infirmities that once were scourged with anger shall now be bathed with love. The cross in place of the gallows: sublime and yet so simple.