I know that two and two make four - and should be glad to prove it too if I could - though I must say if by any sort of process I could convert 2 and 2 into five it would give me much greater pleasure.

Sorrow is knowledge, those that know the most must mourn the deepest, the tree of knowledge is not the tree of life.

The busy have no time for tears.

It is useless to tell one not to reason but to believe - you might as well tell a man not to wake but sleep.

Man's love is of man's life a part; it is a woman's whole existence. In her first passion, a woman loves her lover, in all the others all she loves is love.

I am sure of nothing so little as my own intentions.

He who surpasses or subdues mankind, must look down on the hate of those below.

If I don't write to empty my mind, I go mad.

Absence - that common cure of love.

I have a great mind to believe in Christianity for the mere pleasure of fancying I may be damned.

There's naught, no doubt, so much the spirit calms as rum and true religion.

This is the patent age of new inventions for killing bodies, and for saving souls. All propagated with the best intentions.

As long as I retain my feeling and my passion for Nature, I can partly soften or subdue my other passions and resist or endure those of others.

What is fame? The advantage of being known by people of whom you yourself know nothing, and for whom you care as little.

For what were all these country patriots born? To hunt, and vote, and raise the price of corn?

Smiles form the channels of a future tear.

Romances I ne'er read like those I have seen.

Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt In solitude, where we are least alone.

Though sages may pour out their wisdom's treasure, there is no sterner moralist than pleasure.

What a strange thing man is; and what a stranger thing woman.

There is no such thing as a life of passion any more than a continuous earthquake, or an eternal fever. Besides, who would ever shave themselves in such a state?

The 'good old times' - all times when old are good.

The 'good old times' - all times when old are good.

Who loves, raves.