Victor Hugo Quotes - Page 29

• The truth of an upright man must be accepted on his own terms. Moreover, since natures vary, we must agree that all the beauties of human excellence may be fostered by faiths that we do not share.

  Victor Hugo

  Men, Excellence, Upright Man

  Victor Hugo (1980). “Les misérables”, Viking Pr

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• Sublime upon sublime scarcely presents a contrast, and we need a little rest from everything, even the beautiful.

  Victor Hugo

  Beautiful, Sublime, Needs

  Victor Hugo (1909). “The Works of Victor Hugo ...”

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• To destroy abuses is not enough; Habits must also be changed. The windmill has gone, but the wind is still there." ~old man G--- to Monseigneur Bienvenu Myriel

  Victor Hugo

  Men, Wind, Abuse

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• A strange thing has happened, do you know? I am in darkness. There is a person who, departing, took away the sun.

  Victor Hugo

  Darkness, Sun, Strange

  Victor Hugo (1980). “Les misérables”, Viking Pr

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• What dangers you run, O noble souls! Often, you give your heart, but we take only your body. Your heart is left to you and you look at it in the shadows and shudder.

  Victor Hugo

  Running, Heart, Giving

  Victor Hugo (2008). “Les Misérables”, Random House LLC

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• Philosophy should be an energy; it should find its aim and its effect in the amelioration of mankind.

  Victor Hugo

  Philosophy, Energy, Should

  Victor Hugo, Charles Edwin Wilbour (1862). “Cosette”, p.133

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• Everything Changes. The only thing that remains immovable across the centuries and fixes the character of a people is cooking.

  Victor Hugo

  Food, Character, People

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• This first glance of a soul which does not yet know itself is like dawn in the heavens; it is the awakening of something radiant and unknown.

  Victor Hugo

  Philosophical, Heaven, Soul

  Victor Hugo (1894). “The novels, complete and unabridged, of Victor Hugo”

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• We say and exclaim within ourselves without breaking silence, in a tumult where everything speaks except our mouths. The realities of the soul are none the less real for being invisible and impalpable.

  Victor Hugo

  Real, Silence, Soul

  Victor Hugo (1980). “Les misérables”, Viking Pr

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• It is the end. But of what? The end of France? No. The end of kings? Yes.

  Victor Hugo

  Kings, France, Ends

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• My greatness does not extend to this shelf.

  Victor Hugo

  Greatness, Doe, Shelves

  Victor Hugo (2000). “Les Mis??rables”, p.11, Modern Library

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• He left her. She was dissatisfied with him. He had preferred to incur her anger rather than cause her pain. He had kept all the pain for himself.

  Victor Hugo

  Pain, Causes, Left

  Victor Hugo (1996). “The Hunchback of Notre-Dame”, Laurel Leaf

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• That men saw his mask, but the bishop saw his face. That men saw his life, but the bishop saw his conscience.

  Victor Hugo

  Men, Bishops, Faces

  Victor Hugo (1994). “Les Miserables Volume One”, p.153, Wordsworth Editions

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• Wide horizons lead the soul to broad ideas; circumscribed horizons engender narrow ideas; this sometimes condemns great hearts to become small minded.Broad ideas hated by narrow ideas,-this is the very struggle of progress.

  Victor Hugo

  Struggle, Heart, Ideas

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• In the opera we call love, the libretto is almost nothing.

  Victor Hugo

  Opera

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• Here we stop. Upon the threshold of wedding nights stands an angel smiling, his finger on his lip.

  Victor Hugo

  Angel, Night, Lips

  "Les misérables".

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• The eye of a man should be still more reverent before the rising of a young maiden than before the rising of a star. The possibility of touch should increase respect. The down of the peach, the dust of the plum, the radiated crystal of snow, the butterfly’s wing powdered with feathers, are gross things beside that chastity that does not even know it is chaste. The young maiden is only the glimmer of a dream and is not yet statue. Her alcove is hidden in the shadows of the ideal. The indiscreet touch of the eye desecrates this dim penumbra. Here, to gaze, is to profane.

  Victor Hugo

  Dream, Stars, Butterfly

  Victor Hugo (1987). “Les Misérables”, Signet Classics

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• I only take a half share in the civil war; I am willing to die, I am not willing to kill.

  Victor Hugo

  Wisdom, War, Half

  Victor Hugo (2010). “The Works of Victor Hugo”, p.240, BookCaps Study Guides

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• [T]he small is great, the great is small; all is in equilibrium in necessity.

  Victor Hugo

  Science, Equilibrium

  Victor Hugo (1994). “Les Miserables Volume Two”, p.606, Wordsworth Editions

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• Do not economize on the hymeneal rites; do not prune them of their splendor, nor split farthings on the day when you are radiant. A wedding is not house-keeping.

  Victor Hugo

  House, Splits, Splendor

  Victor Hugo (2007). “Hugo's Works”, p.211, Wildside Press LLC

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• There is something more terrible than a hell of suffering--a hell of boredom.

  Victor Hugo

  Boredom, Suffering, Hell

  Victor Hugo, Charles Edwin Wilbour (1987). “Les misérables”, Dutton Adult

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• ...Though we chisel away as best we can at the mysterious block from which our life is made, the black vein of destiny continually reappears.

  Victor Hugo

  Block, Destiny, Black

  Victor Hugo, Charles Edwin Wilbour (1987). “Les misérables”, Dutton Adult

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• There is no supernatural, there is only nature. Nature alone exists and contains all. All is. There is the part of nature that we perceive, and the part of nature that we do not perceive. ... If you abandon these facts, beware; charlatans will light upon them, also the imbecile. There is no mean: science, or ignorance. If science does not want these facts, ignorance will take them up. You have refused to enlarge human intelligence, you augment human stupidity. When Laplace withdraws Cagliostro appears.

  Victor Hugo

  Nature, Ignorance, Mean

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• Gavroche had fallen only to rise again; he sat up, a long stream of blood rolled down his face, he raised both arms in air, looked in the direction whence the shot came, and began to sing.

  Victor Hugo

  Air, Blood, Long

  Victor Hugo (2012). “Les Miserables”, p.487, Simon and Schuster

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• The jostling of young minds against each other has this wonderful attribute, that one can never foresee the spark, nor predict the flash. What will spring up in a moment? Nobody knows.

  Victor Hugo

  Laughter, Spring, Doors

  "Les misérables".

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