Books have the same enemies as people: fire, humidity, animals, weather, and their own content.
History is the science of things which are not repeated.
That which has always been accepted by everyone, everywhere, is almost certain to be false.
A businessman is a hybrid of a dancer and a calculator.
A painter should not paint what he sees but what should be seen.
Books have the same enemies as people fire, humidity, animals, weather, and their own content.
That which has been believed by everyone, always and everywhere, has every chance of being false.
Poe is the only impeccable writer. He was never mistaken.
God created man and, finding him not sufficiently alone, gave him a companion to make him feel his solitude more keenly.
A man is infinitely more complicated than his thoughts.
What others think of us would be of little moment did it not, when known, so deeply tinge what we think of ourselves.
Our judgments judge us, and nothing reveals us, exposes our weaknesses, more ingeniously than the attitude of pronouncing upon our fellows.
The future, like everything else, is not what it used to be.
A poem is never finished, only abandoned.
Power without abuse loses its charm.
Serious-minded people have few ideas. People with ideas are never serious.
Serious people have few ideas. People with ideas are never serious.
Science means simply the aggregate of all the recipes that are always successful. All the rest is literature.
Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them.
Politics is the art of preventing people from sticking their noses in things that are properly their business.
Politics is the art of preventing people from busying themselves with what is their own business.
Politeness is organized indifference.
Peace is a virtual, mute, sustained victory of potential powers against probable greeds.
Man is only man at the surface. Remove the skin, dissect, and immediately you come to machinery.
Love is being stupid together.
Long years must pass before the truths we have made for ourselves become our very flesh.
