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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.

Stendhal

Love has always been the most important business in my life; I should say the only one.
STENDHAL

Business Important Life Love Myself Oneself
If you want to be witty, work on your character and say what you think on every occasion.
STENDHAL

Character Occasion Thinking Work Yourself
In our calling, we have to choose; we must make our fortune either in this world or in the next, there is no middle way.
STENDHAL

Call Choice Fortune Way World
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.
STENDHAL

Anxiety Conscious Evidence Family Heart Intimacy Life People Polite Quality
A novel is a mirror carried along a main road.
STENDHAL

Carry Main Mirror Novel Road
The first qualification for a historian is to have no ability to invent.
STENDHAL

Ability History Invention Qualification
The French are the wittiest, the most charming, and up to the present, at all events, the least musical race on Earth.
STENDHAL

Charm Earth Event Present
God’s only excuse is that he does not exist.
STENDHAL

Excuse Existence God Himself
Any man who talks about his love affairs thereby proves he is ignorant of love and is moved only by vanity.
STENDHAL

Ignorance Love Man Move Talk Vanity
Every true passion thinks only of itself.
STENDHAL

Passion Thinking True
This religion takes away the courage of thinking of unusual things and prohibits self-examination above all as the most egregious of sins. It is one step away from protestantism.
STENDHAL

Courage Examination Myself Religion Sin Thinking
When a man leaves his mistress, he runs the risk of being betrayed two or three times daily.
STENDHAL

Betrayal Leaving Man Risk Time
At a distance, we cannot conceive of the authority of a despot who knows all his subjects on sight.
STENDHAL

Authority Distance Sight Subject
It is not enough for a landscape to be interesting in itself. Eventually there must be a moral and historic interest.
STENDHAL

Enough History Interest Moral
One of the traits of genius is not to drag its thought through the rut worn by vulgar minds.
STENDHAL

Drag Genius Mindset Thinking Vulgar
Nothing is so hideous as an obsolete fashion.
STENDHAL

Fashion Hide
The boredom of married life inevitable destroys love, when love has preceded marriage.
STENDHAL

Boredom Destroy Herself Marriage Youth
Prudery is a kind of avarice, the worst of all.
STENDHAL

Kind Vice Worst
Napoleon was indeed the man sent by God to help the youth of France! Who is to take his place?
STENDHAL

God Help Man Place Youth
The sight of anything extremely beautiful, in nature or in art, brings back the memory of what one loves, with the speed of lightning.
STENDHAL

Beautiful Light Love Sight Speed
Friendship has its illusions no less than love.
STENDHAL

Friendship Illusion Love
A very small matter, when all is said; only a fool would be concerned about it.
STENDHAL

Concern Fools Small Thinking
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.
STENDHAL

Accomplishment Creature Extreme Greatness Possible
Spring appears and we are once more children.
STENDHAL

Appearance Children Ourselves Spring
Almost all our misfortunes in life come from the wrong notions we have about the things that happen to us.
STENDHAL

Life Ourselves Perspective Wrong
True love makes the thought of death frequent, easy, without terrors; it merely becomes the standard of comparison, the price one would pay for many things.
STENDHAL

Comparison Death Love Pay Standard Thinking True
Power, after love, is the first source of happiness.
STENDHAL

Happiness Love Power Source

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.

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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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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