On this point, the priest and the philosopher agree: We must die.

There is one thing stronger than all the armies in the world, and that is an idea whose time as come.

Die, very good, but do not make others die. Suicides like the one which is about to take place here are sublime, but suicide is restricted, and does not allow of extension; and so soon as it affects your neighbors, suicide becomes murder.

Joy is the reflex of terror.

To gaze into the depths of the sea is, in the imagination, like beholding the vast unknown, and from its most terrible point of view. The submarine gulf is analogous to the realm of night and dreams. There also is sleep, unconsciousness, or at least apparent unconsciousness, of creation. There in the awful silence and darkness, the rude first forms of life, phantomlike, demoniacal, pursue their horrible instincts.

A bit of mould is a pleiad of flowers; a nebula is an ant-hill of stars.

Science says the first word on everything, and the last word on nothing.