Sometimes it seems to me that the devil, the nobility and the Jesuits only exist because we believe in them. As for the devil, we can say that this is certainly true, because until now he has only been seen by believers.
Some imagine they know exactly what the bird looks like if they have seen the egg from which it hatched.
Some must be beaten with the stick during their lifetime. After death they can no longer be punished, nor dishonest.
Irony is always the main element of tragedy. The most monstrous, the most terrible, the worst possible thing, in order not to become devoid of poetry, must be represented in a funny colored coat, seasoned with laughter. Therefore, in King Lear, Shakspeare tells us the most terrible joke through the mouth of the clown, therefore Goethe chose for the most terrible opera, for Faust, the form of the theater has puppets, and the greatest poet, our God himself, dripped humor in all the terrible scenes of our life.
A true democrat writes, like the people, honestly, simply and stupidly.
Historians who want to make history themselves are like German actors obsessed with writing the plays themselves.
Jewish history is wonderful, but modern Jews tarnish the image of their ancestors who could be valued at a much higher level than the Greeks and Romans. It seems to me that if the Jews were to disappear, and if someone found out that a representative of this people was somewhere, they would travel hundreds of hours to see him and shake his hand - but now we are bypassed!
The history of literature is a great cemetery, where everyone discovers the dead whom he appreciates or is related to.
Unfortunately, it can never be determined with certainty when love becomes most like hell and when it becomes like heaven, just as it can never be determined whether angels disguised as devils or devils disguised as angels await you there.
Each age acquires new ideas, also acquires new eyes.
Every author, no matter how famous, tends to make his writings impress. Even in the Bible, those divine records, it says very clearly that He created man for His glory and honor.
Every man is a world that is born and dies with him; under each tombstone lies the history of the whole world.
Just as in a glass of water is contained the whole world of small unusual animals, which are witnesses of the divine power as well as huge beasts, so also the smallest almanac of the muses contains a multitude of tiny poets who arouse no less interest in the explorer , than the biggest elephants of literature. God is great indeed!
As Muhammad was a camel driver until the angel commissioned him to become a prophet, he would have remained not only a camel driver, but simply a camel, had not a new light dawned before him.
Horrible as war is, it shows the spiritual power of man challenging the most powerful hereditary adversary - death.
As wise men are often foolish, so the foolish are distinguished by wisdom.
As theaters burn down several times before rising like a phoenix from the ashes, rising into a magnificent edifice, so it is with some bankers: the present edifice, after three or four bankruptcies, shines as bright as ever. After each fire it rises with even greater grandeur - probably the creditors were not insured.
The Catholic priest walks as if heaven were his property; the Protestant, on the contrary, walks as if he had rented heaven.
A book needs deadlines like a child. Everything happens quickly, books written in a few weeks awaken in me a known prejudice against the author. A decent woman does not give birth to the child before the expiration of the nine-month period.
When God in heaven hates it, open the window and look at the Parisian boulevards.
When the critic's eyes are clouded with tears, his opinion counts for little.
When the vice is grand, it outrages less. The Englishwoman, ashamed of the naked statuette, was less shocked at the sight of the giant Hercules: "At such dimensions, things no longer seem so indecent to me."
When cooks meet, they talk about their masters, and when German authors meet, they talk about their publishers.
When the heroes leave, the clowns appear in the arena.
I used to think that the most terrible thing was the infidelity of a woman, and to express myself as terrible as possible, I called women vipers. But, alas! Now I know for sure: the most terrible thing is that they are not really snakes, because snakes can change their skin every year and rejuvenate in their new skin.
Whoever Jupiter wants to punish, he makes a poet.
Beautiful rhymes rarely serve as crutches for lame thinking.
Critics are like porters in front of the doors at a palace ball: they can let pass those who are properly dressed, detain those who are inappropriately dressed and those who do not have an entrance ticket, but they cannot enter.
He who loves the people must take them to the bathroom.
It's easy to forgive your enemies when you don't have the brains to hurt them, and it's easy to be innocent with a pimple-filled nose.