The innocence of virgins is like milk which turns when exposed to a clap of thunder, to a tart smell, to a hot day, to the merest nothing..

In smart society men are jealous of one another after the fashion of women..

Temperament is the thermometer of character..

Inspiration is the opportunity of genius..

In a husband, there is only a man; in a married woman, there is a man, a father, a mother and a woman..

Music is of two kinds: one petty, poor, second-rate, never varying, its base the hundred or so phrasings which all musicians understand, a babbling w….

Journalists grow accustomed to seeing evil and they let it pass; they proceed to approve it, and they end by committing it themselves..

A society of atheists would immediately invent a religion..

Nothing is a greater impediment to being on good terms with others than being ill at ease with yourself..

When attempted self-destruction does not cure a man of life, it cures him of voluntary death..

A monster which devours everything - that is familiarity..

Nature makes only dumb animals. We owe the fools to society..

Happiness lends poetic charms to woman, and dress adorns her like a delicate tinge of rouge..

Marriage must fight constantly against a monster which devours everything: routine..

Paris, like every pretty woman, is subject to inexplicable whims of beauty and ugliness..

A sacrament by virtue of which each imparts nothing but vexations to the other..

Once she has committed sin, there is nothing left for the Protestant woman, whereas the Catholic Church, hope of forgiveness makes a woman sublime..

Thinking is seeing.... Every human science is based on deduction, which is a slow process of seeing by which we work up from the effect to the cause;….

A lover always thinks of his mistress first and himself second; with a husband it runs the other way..

Generally our confidences move downward rather than upward; in our secret affairs, we employ our inferiors much more than our bettors..

Like most young people, these two attributed to the world their own intelligence and virtues. Youth who knows no failure has no mercy on the faults o….