Quote collection
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"Who then understands the reciprocal flux and reflux of the infinitely great and the infinitely small, the echoing of causes in the abysses of being, and the avalanches of creation?"
"At that moment of love, a moment when passion is absolutely silent under omnipotence of ecstasy, Marius, pure seraphic Marius, would have been more capable of visiting a woman of the streets than of raising Cosette’s dress above the ankle. Once on a moonlit night, Cosette stopped to pick up something from the ground, her dress loosened and revealed the swelling of her breasts. Marius averted his eyes."
"Whenever a man's friends begin to compliment him about looking young, he may be sure that they think he is growing old."
"Marius was of the temperament that sinks into grief and remains there; Cosette was of the sort that plunges in and comes out again."
"Brothers, he who dies here dies in the radiance of the future, and we are entering a tomb all flooded with the dawn."
"For sight is woman-like and shuns the old."
"You say, "Where goest Thou?" I cannot tell, And still go on. But if the way be straight I cannot go amiss: before me lies Dawn and the day: the night behind me: that Suffices me: I break the bounds: I see, And nothing more; believe and nothing less. My future is not one of my concerns."
"He was fond of books, for they are cool and sure friends"
"God whose gifts in gracious flood Unto all who seek are sent, Only asks you to be good And is content."
"Wide horizons lead the soul to broad ideas; circumscribed horizons engender narrow ideas; this sometimes condemns great hearts to become small minded.Broad ideas hated by narrow ideas,-this is the very struggle of progress."
"It is the end. But of what? The end of France? No. The end of kings? Yes."
"Dark Error's other hidden side is truth."
"God was bored by him."
"We are on the side of religion as opposed to religions, and we are among those who believe in the wretched inadequacy of sermons and the sublimity of prayer."
"Whenever we encounter the Infinite in man, however imperfectly understood, we treat it with respect. Whether in the synagogue, the mosque, the pagoda, or the wigwam, there is a hideous aspect which we execrate and a sublime aspect which we venerate. So great a subject for spiritual contemplation, such measureless dreaming - the echo of God on the human wall!"
"When, like an Emir of tyrannic power, Sirius appears, and on the horizon black Bids countless stars pursue their mighty track."
"Primitive times are lyrical, ancient times epical, modern times dramatic. The ode sings of eternity, the epic imparts solemnity tohistory, the drama depicts life. The characteristic of the first poetry is ingeniousness, of the second, simplicity, of the third, truth."
"Happiness lies for those who cry, those who hurt, those who have searched, and those who have tried for only they can appreciate the importance of people who have touched their lives."
"Every idea must have a visible enfolding."
"The English took the eagle and Austrians the eaglet. [Fr., L'Angleterre prit l'aigle, et l'Autriche l'aiglon.]"