“A picture’s beauty does not depend on the things portrayed in it.”

One must never miss an opportunity of quoting things by others which are always more interesting than those one thinks up oneself.

Remembrance of things past is not necessarily the remembrance of things as they were.

Instead of seeking new landscapes, develop new eyes.

Dear Friend: I have nearly died three times since morning.

If a little dreaming is dangerous, the cure for it is not to dream less but to dream more, to dream all the time.

Do not wait for life. Do not long for it. Be aware, always and at every moment, that the miracle is in the here and now.

Let us leave pretty women to men devoid of imagination.

Reality is never more than a first step towards an unknown on the road to which one can never progress very far.

Nine tenths of the ills from which intelligent people suffer spring from their intellect.

We are at times too ready to believe that the present is the only possible state of things.

The creation of the world did not occur at the beginning of time, it occurs every day.

You can’t learn the truth about a man’s intentions by asking him.

All our final decisions are made in a state of mind that is not going to last.

A woman one loves rarely suffices for all our needs, so we deceive her with another whom we do not love.

The time at our disposal each day is elastic; the passions we feel dilate it, those that inspire us shrink it, and habit fills it.

It has been said that beauty is a promise of happiness. Conversely, the possibility of pleasure can be a beginning of beauty.

All life is problem-solving.

None of our beliefs are quite true; all have at least a penumbra of vagueness and error.

Vultures are the most righteous of birds: they do not attack even the smallest living creature.

It’s not hard to own something. Or everything. You just have to know that it’s yours, and then be willing to let it go.

We often confuse what we wish for with what is.

I can believe things that are true and things that aren’t true and I can believe things where nobody knows if they’re true or not.

As the archeology of our thought easily shows, man is an invention of recent date. And one perhaps nearing its end.

The secret of happiness is very simple: let your interests be as wide as possible, and let your reactions to the things and persons that interest you be as far as possible friendly rather than hostile.