Our systems, perhaps, are nothing more than an unconscious apology for our faults, a gigantic scaffolding whose object is to hide from us our favorite sin.
— Henri Frederic Amiel
Let us be true: this is the highest maxim of art and of life, the secret of eloquence and of virtue, and of all moral authority.
The test of every religious, political, or educational system is the man that it forms.
Any landscape is a condition of the spirit.
Without passion man is a mere latent force and possibility, like the flint which awaits the shock of the iron before it can give forth its spark.
Thought is a kind of opium; it can intoxicate us, while still broad awake; it can make transparent the mountains and everything that exists.
If nationality is consent, the state is compulsion.
He who asks of life nothing but the improvement of his own nature... is less liable than anyone else to miss and waste life.
We are never more discontented with others than when we are discontented with ourselves.
Order is power.
The fire which enlightens is the same fire which consumes.
In every loving woman there is a priestess of the past - a pious guardian of some affection, of which the object has disappeared.
Every life is a profession of faith, and exercises an inevitable and silent influence.
Destiny has two ways of crushing us - by refusing our wishes and by fulfilling them.
Pure truth cannot be assimilated by the crowd; it must be communicated by contagion.
Cleverness is serviceable for everything, sufficient for nothing.
Analysis kills spontaneity. The grain once ground into flour springs and germinates no more.
Tell me what you feel in your room when the full moon is shining in upon you and your lamp is dying out, and I will tell you how old you are, and I shall know if you are happy.
Woman is the salvation or the destruction of the family. She carries its destiny in the folds of her mantle.
Truth is not only violated by falsehood; it may be equally outraged by silence.
Uncertainty is the refuge of hope.
So long as a person is capable of self-renewal they are a living being.
Tears are the symbol of the inability of the soul to restrain its emotion and retain its self command.
The only substance properly so called is the soul.
Sacrifice, which is the passion of great souls, has never been the law of societies.
Sympathy is the first condition of criticism.
Order is a great person's need and their true well being.
Materialism coarsens and petrifies everything, making everything vulgar, and every truth false.
Life is short and we have never too much time for gladdening the hearts of those who are travelling the dark journey with us. Oh be swift to love, make haste to be kind.
To live we must conquer incessantly, we must have the courage to be happy.
An error is the more dangerous in proportion to the degree of truth which it contains.
Common sense is the measure of the possible; it is composed of experience and prevision; it is calculation applied to life.
It is not what he had, or even what he does which expresses the worth of a man, but what he is.
For purposes of action nothing is more useful than narrowness of thought combined with energy of will.
Blessed be childhood, which brings down something of heaven into the midst of our rough earthliness.
Music is harmony, harmony is perfection, perfection is our dream, and our dream is heaven.
In health there is freedom. Health is the first of all liberties.
Sacrifice still exists everywhere, and everywhere the elect of each generation suffers for the salvation of the rest.
Action is coarsened thought; thought becomes concrete, obscure, and unconscious.
To know how to suggest is the great art of teaching. To attain it we must be able to guess what will interest; we must learn to read the childish soul as we might a piece of music. Then, by simply changing the key, we keep up the attraction and vary the song.
Self-interest is but the survival of the animal in us. Humanity only begins for man with self-surrender.
To shun one's cross is to make it heavier.
The man who insists upon seeing with perfect clearness before he decides, never decides. Accept life, and you must accept regret.
Society lives by faith, and develops by science.
To marry unequally is to suffer equally.
Clever people will recognize and tolerate nothing but cleverness.
It is by teaching that we teach ourselves, by relating that we observe, by affirming that we examine, by showing that we look, by writing that we think, by pumping that we draw water into the well.
The best path through life is the highway.
Common sense is calculation applied to life.
Thankfulness is the beginning of gratitude. Gratitude is the completion of thankfulness. Thankfulness may consist merely of words. Gratitude is shown in acts.
