“On this narrow planet, we have only the choice between two unknown worlds. One of them tempts us – ah! what a dream, to live in that! – the other stifles us at the first breath.”

At sixty-three years of age, less a quarter, one still has plans.

It is not a bad thing that children should occasionally, and politely, put parents in their place.

If he’s getting married, he’s not longer interesting.

I’ve entered the world of wine without any professional training, but a definite appetite for good bottles.

I have found my voice again and the art of using it.

We only do well the things we like doing.

A pretty little collection of weaknesses and a terror of spiders are our indispensable stock-in-trade with the men.

Never touch a butterfly’s wing with your finger.

Books, books, books. It was not that I read so much. I read and re-read the same ones. But all of them were necessary to me. Their presence, their smell, the letters of their titles, and the texture of their leather bindings.

One keeps forgetting old age up to the very brink of the grave.

As for an authentic villain, the real thing, the absolute, the artist, one rarely meets him even once in a lifetime. The ordinary bad hat is always in part a decent fellow.

The faults of husbands are often caused by the excess virtues of their wives.

Be happy. It’s one way of being wise.

Total absence of humor renders life impossible.

The day after that wedding night I found that a distance of a thousand miles, abyss and discovery and irremediable metamorphosis, separated me from the day before.

The true traveler is he who goes on foot, and even then, he sits down a lot of the time.

For every great temptation there will be many small ones. Wolves and bears are more dangerous than flies, but we are bothered most by flies.

Avoid the temptation to work so hard that there is no time left for serious thinking.

If only we could see the joy of our guardian angel when he sees us fighting our temptations!

Women are so strange in their influence that they tempt you to misplaced kindness.

After you have written a thing and you reread it, there is always the temptation to fix it up, to improve it, to remove its poison, blunt its sting.

In spite of all temptations of belonging to many nations, I’ve remained an Indian.

Every conquering temptation represents a new fund of moral energy. Every trial endured and weathered in the right spirit makes a soul nobler and stronger than it was before.

And O! be sure to fear the Lord alway, And mind your duty, duly, morn and night; Lest in temptation’s path ye gang astray, Implore His counsel and assisting might: They never sought in vain that sought the Lord aright.