We swallow greedily any lie that flatters us, but we sip only little by little at a truth we find bitter.

People praise virtue, but they hate it, they run away from it. It freezes you to death, and in this world you've got to keep your feet warm.

Bad company is as instructive as licentiousness. One makes up for the loss of one’s innocence with the loss of one’s prejudices.

If there is one realm in which it is essential to be sublime, it is in wickedness. You spit on a petty thief, but you can’t deny a kind of respect for the great criminal.

Every man has his dignity. I'm willing to forget mine, but at my own discretion and not when someone else tells me to.

Shakespeare’s fault is not the greatest into which a poet may fall. It merely indicates a deficiency of taste.

When shall we see poets born? After a time of disasters and great misfortunes, when harrowed nations begin to breathe again. And then, shaken by the terror of such spectacles, imaginations will paint things entirely strange to those who have not witnessed them.

Poetry must have something in it that is barbaric, vast and wild.

It is not human nature we should accuse but the despicable conventions that pervert it.

Genius is present in every age, but the men carrying it within them remain benumbed unless extraordinary events occur to heat up and melt the mass so that it flows forth.