Gaiety — a quality of ordinary men. Genius always presupposes some disorder in the machine.

The first promise exchanged by two beings of flesh was at the foot of a rock that was crumbling into dust; they took as witness for their constancy a sky that is not the same for a single instant; everything changed in them and around them, and they believed their hearts free of vicissitudes. O children! always children!

How easy it is to tell tales!

How did they meet? By chance, like everybody … Where did they come from? From the nearest place. Where were they going? Do we know where we are going?

Jacques said that his master said that everything good or evil we encounter here below was written on high.

There is not a Musselman alive who would not imagine that he was performing an action pleasing to God and his Holy Prophet by exterminating every Christian on earth, while the Christians are scarcely more tolerant on their side.

The most dangerous madmen are those created by religion, and … people whose aim is to disrupt society always know how to make good use of them on occasion.

The blood of Jesus Christ can cover a multitude of sins, it seems to me.

The decisions of law courts should never be printed: in the long run, they form a counterauthority to the law.

The general interest of the masses might take the place of the insight of genius if it were allowed freedom of action.