Revolutions spring not from accident, but from necessity. A revolution is a return from the factitious to the real. It takes place because it must.

Great buildings, like great mountains, are the work of centuries.

If you look in the eyes of the young, you see flame. If you look in the eyes of the old, you see light.

The women laughed and wept; the crowd stamped their feet enthusiastically, for at that moment Quasimodo was really beautiful. He was handsome — this orphan, this foundling, this outcast.

Success is an ugly thing. Men are deceived by its false resemblances to merit.... They confound the brilliance of the firmament with the star-shaped footprints of a duck in the mud.

When we are at the end of life, to die means to go away; when we are at the beginning, to go away means to die.

Revolutions are not born of chance but of necessity.