The more estimable the offender, the greater the torment.

If there’s life on other planets, then the earth is the Universe’s insane asylum.

Originality is nothing but judicious plagiarism.

You see, Mademoiselle, I have experience, I know the world. To pass the time, why don't you ask every passenger to tell you his life's story? And if there is a single one among them who has never cursed his life, who has not often told himself that he was the unhappiest of men, then you may throw me overboard, headfirst!

The prudent man does himself good; the virtuous one does it to other men.

Indeed, history is nothing more than a tableau of crimes and misfortunes.

If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him; let us worship God through Jesus if we must - if ignorance has so far prevailed that this name can still be spoken in all seriousness without being taken as a synonym for rapine and carnage. Every sensible man, every honourable man, must hold the Christian sect in horror.