Men have torn up the roads which led to Heaven, and which all the world followed; now we have to make our own ladders.
A work is perfectly finished only when nothing can be added to it and nothing taken away.
The lively phraseology of Montesquieu was the result of long meditation. His words, as light as wings, bear on them grave reflections.
All are born to observe order, but few are born to establish it.
The evening of a well spent youth brings it's lamps with it.
Never write anything that does not give you great pleasure. Emotion is easily transferred from the writer to the reader.
Without duty, life is soft and boneless.
Innocence is always unsuspicious.
Old age takes from the man of intellect no qualities save those that are useless to wisdom.
You arrive at truth through poetry; I arrive at poetry through truth.
Genuine witticisms surprise those who say them as much as those who listen to them; they arise in us in spite of us, or, at least, without our participation,--like everything inspired.
Sexes. One has the look of a wound, the other of something skinned.
Nothing which does not transport is poetry. The lyre is a winged instrument.
There is always some frivolity in excellent minds; they have wings to rise, but also stray.
Virtue by calculation is the virtue of vice.
It is easier to be mistaken about the true than the beautiful.
All disputation makes the mind deaf; and when people are deaf, I am dumb.
Men must be either the slaves of duty, or the slaves of force.
Contempt for private wrongs was one of the features of ancient morals.
Fully to understand a grand and beautiful thought requires, perhaps, as much time as to conceive it.
The last word should be the last word. It is like a finishing touch given to color; there is nothing more to add. But what precaution is needed in order not to put the last word first.
There is in the soul a taste for the good, just as there is in the body an appetite for enjoyment.
There are those to whom one must advise madness.
The mind conceives with pain, but it brings forth with delight.
Lenity is a part of justice; but she must not speak too loud for fear of waking justice.
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