1
Who is to decide which is the grimmer sight: withered hearts, or empty skulls?Unknown
2
Some day you will find out that there is far more happiness in another's happiness than in your own.Unknown
3
A letter is a soul, so faithful an echo of the speaking voice that to the sensitive it is among the richest treasures of love.Unknown
4
If the human heart sometimes finds moments of pause as it ascends the slopes of affection, it rarely halts on the way down.Unknown
5
However gross a man may be, the minute he expresses a strong and genuine affection, some inner secretion alters his features, animates his gestures, and colors his voice. The stupidest man will often, under the stress of passion, achieve heights of eloquence, in thought if not in language, and seem to move in some luminous sphere. Goriot's voice and gesture had at this moment the power of communication that characterizes the great actor. Are not our finer feelings the poems of the human will?.Unknown
6
Women are always true, even in the midst of their greatest falsities, because they are always influenced by some natural feeling.Unknown
7
Ah! What pleasure it must be to a woman to suffer for the one she loves!Unknown
8
Where some one else's welfare is concerned, a young girl becomes as ingenious as a thief. Guileless where she herself is in question, and full of foresight for me, --she is like a heavenly angel forgiving the strange incomprehensible sins of earth.Unknown
9
No one ought even to desert a woman after throwing her a heap of gold in her distress! He ought to love her forever! You are young, only twenty-one, and kind and upright and fine. You'll ask me how a woman can take money from a man. Oh, God, isn't it natural to share everything with the one we owe all our happiness to? When one has given everything, how can one quibble about a mere portion of it? Money is important only when feeling has ceased. Isn't one bound for life? How can you foresee separation when you think someone loves you? When a man swears eternal love--how can there be any separate concerns in that case?.Unknown
10
The viscountess had raised the forefinger of her right hand and made a pretty gesture toward a stool at her feet. There was such intense tyrannical passion in the gesture that the marquis relinquished the doorknob and came back.Unknown
11
It is always assumed by the empty-headed, who chatter about themselves for want of something better, that people who do not discuss their affairs openly must have something to hide.Unknown
12
What moralists describe as the mysteries of the human heart are solely the deceiving thoughts, the spontaneous impulses of self-regard. The sudden changes in character, about which so much has been said, are instinctive calculations for the furtherance of our own pleasures. Seeing himself now in his fine clothes, his new gloves and shoes, Eugène de Rastignac forgot his noble resolve. Youth, when it swerves toward wrong, dares not look in the mirror of conscience; maturity has already seen itself there. That is the whole difference between the two phases of life.Unknown
13
Was she acting entirely consciously? No: women are always sincere, even in the midst of their most shocking duplicities, because it is always some natural emotion which dominates them. Perhaps, having given this young man such a hold on her, by having openly demonstrated her affection for him, Delphine was merely responding to a sense of personal dignity, which led her either to revoke any concessions she might have made or, at least, to enjoy suspending them. Even at the very moment when passion seizes her, it is perfectly natural for a Parisian woman to delay her final fall, as a way of testing the heart of the man into whose hands she is about to deliver herself and her future! .Unknown
14
How did you get back?' asked Vautrin. 'I walked, ' replied Eugene.'I wouldn't like half-pleasures, myself, ' observed the tempter. 'I'd want to go there in my own carriage, have my own box, and come back in comfort. All or nothing, that's my motto.'' And a very good one, ' said Madame Vauquer.Unknown
15
Is there any instinct more deeply implanted in the heart of man than the pride of protection, a protection which is constantly exerted for a fragile and defenceless creature?Unknown
16
Our heart is a treasury; if you pour out all its wealth at once, you are bankrupt.Unknown
17
Perhaps it is only human nature to inflict suffering on anything that will endure suffering, whether by reason of its genuine humility, or indifference, or sheer helplessness.Unknown
18
The human heart may find here and there a resting-place short of the highest height of affection, but we seldom stop in the steep, downward slope of hatred.Unknown
19
Such is life. It is no cleaner than a kitchen; it reeks like a kitchen; and if you mean to cook your dinner, you must expect to soil your hands; the real art is in getting them clean again, and therein lies the whole morality of our epoch.Unknown
20
Though the human heart may have to pause for rest when climbing the heights of affection it rarely stops on the slippery slope of hatred.Unknown
21
Of necessity she went further in aversion than she had gone in love, for her hatred was not in proportion to her love but to her disappointed hopes.Unknown
22
If youth were not ignorant and timid, civilization would be impossible.Unknown
23
He hesitated till the last moment, but finally dropped them in the box, saying, "I shall win! "--the cry of a gambler, the cry of the great general, the compulsive cry that has ruined more men than it has ever saved.Unknown
24
Here comes Mamma Vauquerr, fair as a starrr; and strung up like a bunch of carrots. Aren't we suffocating ourselves a wee bit?' he asked, placing a hand on the top of her corset. 'A bit of a crush in the vestibule, here, Mamma! If we start crying, there'll be an explosion. Never mind, I'll be there to collect the bits--just like an antiquary.'' Now, there's the language of true French gallantry, ' murmured Madame Vauquer in an aside to Madame Couture. .Unknown
25
A man like you is a god, not just a machine covered with skin, but a theater where fine feelings sprout and grow-and feelings are all that matters, as far as I'm concerned. Is a feeling anything but an entire world poured into a thought?Unknown
26
We flew back home like swallows. 'Is it happiness that makes us so light?' Agathe asked.Unknown