“When lovers kiss on the cheeks, it is because they are searching, feeling for one another’s lips. Lovers are made by a kiss.”

Art for me…is a negation of society, an affirmation of the individual, outside of all the rules and all the demands of society.

A god of kindness would be charitable to all. Your god of wrath and punishment is but a monstrous phantasy.

Blow the candle out, I don’t need to see what my thoughts look like.

I would rather die of passion than of boredom.

The conclusion does not belong to the artist.

If you shut up truth and bury it under the ground, it will but grow, and gather to itself such explosive power that the day it bursts through it will blow up everything in its way.

Paris flared – Paris, which the divine sun had sown with light, and where in glory waved the great future harvest of Truth and of Justice.

It is not I who am strong, it is reason, it is truth.

What will be the death of me are buillabaisses, food spiced with pimiento, shellfish, and a load of exquisite rubbish which I eat in disproportionate quantities.

She was cold by nature, self-love predominating over passion; rather than being virtuous, she preferred to have her pleasures all to herself.

The fate of animals is of greater importance to me than the fear of appearing ridiculous; it is indissolubly connected with the fate of men.

The thought is a deed. Of all deeds she fertilizes the world most.

Has science ever retreated? No! It is Catholicism which has always retreated before her, and will always be forced to retreat.

It all seemed a hollow sham now – that strict code, that conscientious virtue that condemned her to the sterile joys of pious women! No, no, she’d had enough of that; she wanted to live!

The past was but the cemetery of our illusions: one simply stubbed one’s toes on the gravestones.

Classical education has deformed everything, and has imposed upon us as geniuses men of correct, facile talent, who follow the beaten track.

But what is Hope? Nothing but the paint on the face of Existence; the least touch of truth rubs it off, and then we see what a hollow-cheeked harlot we have got hold of.

I see them in my audience all the time, with the fur coat, a woman whose hand is always out front, or the two fingers are on the cheek to show her diamond. I don’t have anything against that.

Our Palestinian brethren continue to be slaughtered at the hands of Israelis while the world turns the other cheek.

Our cheeky sidekick. We’re like a motorcycle and sidecar.

I was age six or seven, and singing, “Jesus wants me for her son, beep, to shine for him,” and people smiled and pinched my cheeks till the blood vessels broke, and I knew I was doing something right.

I learned that from Nana. But rainy days still make my cheeks wet with tears, even now. It was pouring, on that rainy day.

Kiss on forehead, nose and cheek. Repeat.