People are less self-conscious in the intimacy of family life and during the anxiety of a great sorrow. The dazzling varnish of an extreme politeness is then less in evidence, and the true qualities of the heart regain their proper proportions.
Every great action is extreme when it is undertaken. Only after it has been accomplished does it seem possible to those creatures of more common stuff.
There is no such thing as “natural law”: this expression is nothing but old nonsense… Prior to laws, what is natural is only the strength of the lion, or the need of the creature suffering from hunger or cold, in short, need.
Great ladies are no more spiteful than the average rich woman; but one acquires in their society a greater susceptibility, and feels more profoundly andmore irremediably, their unpleasant remarks.
