“Every time government attempts to handle our affairs, it costs more and the results are worse than if we had handled them ourselves.”

Art for art’s sake, with no purpose, for any purpose perverts art. But art achieves a purpose which is not its own. (1804)

The great question in life is the suffering we cause, and the most ingenious metaphysics do not justify the man who has broken the heart that loved him.

There are things one does not say for a long time, but, once they are said, one never stops repeating them.

No duty, however, binds us to these so-called laws, whose corrupting influence menaces what is noblest in our being.

There is a bizarre notion according to which it is claimed that because men are corrupt, it is necessary to give certain of them all the more power… on the contrary, they must be given less power.

Nearly always, so as to live at peace with ourselves, we disguise our own impotence and weakness as calculation and policy; it is our way of placating that half of our being which is in a sense a spectator of the other.

People are hurt in love affairs and never recover, more than a boxing match.

Politics: A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affairs for private advantage.

There is no love affair held in these hands. I am reminded of this time and again.

Future. That period of time in which our affairs prosper, our friends are true and our happiness is assured.

I wonder if it’s possible to have a love affair that lasts forever.

Let your religion be less of a theory and more of a love affair.

To be busy with material affairs is the best preservative against reflection, fears, doubts, all these things which stand in the way of achievement. I suppose a fellow proposing to cut his throat would experience a sort of relief while occupied in stropping his razor carefully.

Whenever fortune wishes to joke, she lifts people from what is humble to the highest extremity of affairs.