A man may call to mind the face of his friend, but not his own. Here, then, is an initial difficulty in the way of applying the maxim, Know Thyself.

Not to go to the theatre is like making one's toilet without a mirror.

Time is that in which all things pass away.

In early youth, as we contemplate our coming life, we are like children in a theatre before the curtain is raised, sitting there in high spirits and eagerly waiting for the play to begin.

The first forty years of life give us the text; the last thirty supply the commentary.

I believe a person of any fine feeling scarcely ever sees a new face without a sensation akin to a shock, for the reason that it presents a new and surprising combination of unedifying elements.

Treat a work of art like a prince: let it speak to you first.

Reading is thinking with someone else's head instead of one's own.

The deep pain that is felt at the death of every friendly soul arises from the feeling that there is in every individual something which is inexpressible, peculiar to him alone, and is, therefore, absolutely and irretrievably lost.

There is only one inborn error, and that is the notion that we exist in order to be happy.