Drunkenness was in good repute in England till "Bloody Mary" frowned upon it; it remained popular in Germany. The French drank more stably, not being quite so cold.

History seldom destroys that which does not deserve to die; and the burning of the tares makes for the next sowing a richer soil.

Our knowledge is a receding mirage in an expanding desert of ignorance.

Truth always originates in a minority of one, and every custom begins as a broken precedent.

As long as there is poverty there will be gods.

The past is not dead. Indeed, it is often not even past.

What if it is for life's sake that we must die? In truth we are not individuals; and it is because we think ourselves such that death seems unforgivable. We are temporary organs of the race, cells in the body of life; we die and drop away that life may remain young and strong. If we were to live forever, growth would be stifled, and youth would find no room on earth. Death, like style, is the removal of rubbish, the circumcision of the superfluous. In the midst of death life renews itself immortally.