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| A fixed idea ends in madness or heroism. | 1 |
| Above the cloud with its shadow is the star with its light. | 2 |
| Curiosity is one of the forms of feminine bravery. | 3 |
| Danger for danger’s sake is senseless. | 4 |
| Emotion is always new. | 5 |
| Every idea must have a visible unfolding. | 6 |
| Great edifices, like great mountains, are the work of ages. | 7 |
| He is the best gentleman that is the son of his own deserts, and not the degenerated heir of another’s virtue. | 8 |
| “Hélas! que j’en ai vu mourir de jeunes filles”—“Alas, how many young girls have I seen die of that!” | 9 |
| Il faut avoir pitié des morts—One must have pity on the dead. | 10 |
| It is from books that wise men derive consolation in the troubles of life. | 11 |
| J’en passe et des meilleurs—I pass by them, and better than they. | 12 |
| La popularité c’est la gloire en gros sous—Popularity is glory in penny-pieces. | 13 |
| Let us fear the worst, but work with faith; the best will always take care of itself. | 14 |
| Life is a voyage. | 15 |
| Luxury is an enticing pleasure, a bastard mirth, which hath honey in her mouth, gall in her heart, and a sting in her tail. | 16 |
| Melancholy is the pleasure of being sad. | 17 |
| Men no longer wholly believe; in this age of blindness and scientific pride, no one is any longer seen bowing before his god on both his knees. | 18 |
| O l’amour d’une mère! amour que nul n’oublie! / Pain merveilleux, que Dieu partage et multiplie! / Table toujours servie au paternel foyer! / Chacun en a sa part, et tous l’ont tout entier—Oh, the love of a mother, love no one forgets; miraculous bread which God distributes and multiplies; board always spread by the paternal hearth, whereat each has his portion, and all have it entire! | 19 |
| Parfois, élus maudits de la fureur suprême, / … Ces envoyés du ciel sont apparus au monde / Comme s’ils venaient de l’enfer—Sometimes these ambassadors of heaven, the accursed elect of the wrath of heaven, appear in the world as though they came from hell. | 20 |
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| People do not lack strength; they lack will. | 21 |
| Progress—the stride of God. | 22 |
| Reverie, which is thought in its nebulous state, borders closely upon the land of sleep, by which it is bordered as by a natural frontier. | 23 |
| Society is a republic. When an individual endeavours to lift himself above his fellows, he is dragged down by the mass, either by ridicule or calumny. | 24 |
| Soyez comme l’oiseau, posé pour un instant / Sur des rameaux trop frêles, / Qui sent ployer la branche et qui chante pourtant, / Sachant qu’il a des ailes—He as the bird perched for an instant on the too frail branch which she feels bending beneath, but sings away all the same, knowing she has wings. | 25 |
| The child’s murmuring is more and is less than words; there are no notes, and yet it is a song; there are no syllables, and yet it is language…. This poor stammering is a compound of what the child said when it was an angel, and of what it will say when it becomes a man. | 26 |
| The sublimest canticle to be heard on earth is the stammering of the human soul on the lips of infancy. | 27 |
| The sword is but a hideous flash in the darkness; right is an eternal ray. | 28 |
| We are the children of our own deeds. | 29 |
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