If I can’t have too many truffles, I’ll do without truffles.

A person is never happy except at the price of some ignorance.

Good taste is the modesty of the mind; that is why it cannot be either imitated or acquired.

Of all lies, art is the least untrue.

The artist must be in his work like God in his Creation, invisible and all-powerful, so that he is felt everywhere but not seen.

Truth titillates the imagination far less than fiction.

‘Men have forgotten this truth,’ said the fox. ‘But you must not forget it. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed.’

Nine tenths of education is encouragement.

Finance, like time, devours its own children.

Exuberance is better than taste.

I believe that if one always looked at the skies, one would end up with wings.

Be happy. It’s one way of being wise.

Only men who are not interested in women are interested in women’s clothes. Men who like women never notice what they wear.

Ignorance and error are necessary to life, like bread and water.

There is no truth. There is only perception.

Madame Bovary is myself.

The wicked are always surprised to find ability in the good.

A happy childhood is poor preparation for human contacts.

No government ought to be without censors; and where the press is free, no one ever will. Chance is the pseudonym of God when he did not want to sign.

Men must stop being jealous of their power and generously allow freedom and responsibility to others. The reward is harmonious families and society.

But the disparaging of those we love always alienates us from them to some extent. We must not touch our idols; the gilt comes off in our hands.

The author, in his work, must be like God in the Universe, present everywhere and visible nowhere.

Variety, multiplicity are the two most powerful vehicles of lust.

Success is not a place at which one arrives but rather the spirit with which one undertakes and continues the journey.

I thank fate for having made me born poor. Poverty taught me the true value of the gifts useful to life.

It is easy to sit up and take notice, What is difficult is getting up and taking action.

Here is true immorality: ignorance and stupidity; the devil is nothing but this. His name is Legion.

The better a work is, the more it attracts criticism; it is like the fleas who rush to jump on white linens.

Sit down and put down everything that comes into your head and then you’re a writer. But an author is one who can judge his own stuff’s worth, without pity, and destroy most of it.

That man is prudent who neither hopes nor fears anything from the uncertain events of the future.

One thing above all gives charm to men’s thoughts, and this is unrest. A mind that is not uneasy irritates and bores me.

All one’s inventions are true, you can be sure of that. Poetry is as exact a science as geometry.

Oh, if I had been loved at the age of seventeen, what an idiot I would be today. Happiness is like smallpox: if you catch it too soon, it can completely ruin your constitution.

Indolence is the sleep of the mind.

Wandering re-establishes the original harmony which once existed between man and the universe.

Proof that they do not understand the republic is that in their fine promises for universal suffrage, they forgot women.

As a rule we disbelieve all the facts and theories for which we have no use.

The cult of art gives pride; one never has too much of it.

It is always by way of pain one arrives at pleasure.

Risk is essential. There is not growth of inspiration in staying within what is safe and comfortable. Once you find out what you do best, why not try something else?

Until one has loved an animal a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.

Behind every great fortune there is a crime.

Human speech is a cracked cauldron on which we knock out tunes for dancing bears, when we wish to conjure pity from the stars.

The fool is like those people who think themselves rich with little.

January, month of empty pockets! let us endure this evil month, anxious as a theatrical producer’s forehead.

You learn to speak by speaking, to study by studying, to run by running, to work by working; in just the same way, you learn to love by loving.

History books that contain no lies are extremely dull.

Everything one invents is true, you may be perfectly sure of that. Poetry is as precise as geometry.

One must always hope when one is desperate, and doubt when one hopes.

‘Til the infallibility of human judgements shall have been proved to me, I shall demand the abolition of the penalty of death.