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

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.

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.

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

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.

If Nature denies eternity to beings, it follows that their destruction is one of her laws.

She was wonderful – just a kind, big-hearted, filthy girl. Somehow she could be vulgar without being vulgar.

You are a divine being. You matter, you count. You come from realms of unimaginable power and light, and you will return to those realms.

You forget that this has been thirty five years now and people don’t look at it as if it were some kind of oddity.

Cruelty, very far from being a vice, is the first sentiment Nature injects in us all.

I’m not playing a role. I’m being myself, whatever the hell that is.

If you give in to intimidation, you’ll go on being intimidated

The traditional face of Africa includes an attitude towards man which can only be described as being socialist