Little things seem nothing, but they give peace, like those meadow flowers which individually seem odorless but all together perfume the air. |
No one ever discovers the depths of his own loneliness. |
Purity is not imposed upon us as though it were a kind of punishment, it is one of those mysterious but obvious conditions of that supernatural knowledge of ourselves in the Divine, which we speak of as faith. Impurity does not destroy this knowledge, it slays our need for it. |
The first sign of corruption in a society that is still alive is that the end justifies the means |
The first sign of corruption in a society that is still alive is that the end justifies the means |
The modern state no longer has anything but rights; it does not recognize duties any more. |
The most dangerous of our calculations are those we call illusions. |
The wish to pray is a prayer in itself |
The wish to pray is a prayer in itself |
The wish to pray is a prayer in itself. God can ask no more than that of us. |
The worst, the most corrupting of lies, are problems poorly stated, |
Truth is meant to save you first, and the comfort comes afterward. |
What a cunning mixture of sentiment, pity, tenderness, irony surrounds adolescence, what knowing watchfulness! Young birds on their first flight are hardly so hovered around. |
What does the truth matter? Haven't we mothers all given our sons a taste for lies, lies which from the cradle upwards lull them, reassure them, send them to sleep: lies as soft and warm as a breast! |
When you think of the huge uninterrupted success of a book like Don Quixote, you're bound to realize that if humankind have not yet finished being revenged, by sheer laughter, for being let down in their greatest hope, it is because that hope was cherished so long and lay so deep! |