When we condemn a fellow creature in refusing to him forever our esteem, we have but ourselves to rely on; and even so, have we the right to make our hearts a tribunal, and summon our neighbor there? Where would the law be, in what would the measure of judgment consist? That which is our weakness is perhaps his strength. To so many different beings so many different circumstances for each act, for no two occurrences are ever the same. Society alone has the right to repress its members. As to punishment, I contest it; the curb is sufficient, and cruel enough at that.
The genius is he who perpetually impresses his deeds with his thought.
When a man feels that he is destined to great things, it is difficult for him to conceal it. The bushel has always crevices through which the light must pass.
Women of the world have a marvelous talent for diminishing their faults. They can efface anything with a smile, a question, or a feigned surprise. They remember nothing, and explain everything; they become astonished, ask questions, criticise, amplify, quarrel, and wind up by chasing their faults away, as easily as they would a spot with a bit of soap. You know them to be black, and in a moment they have become white and innocent. As for you, consider yourself lucky if, in the mean time, they have not found you guilty of some unpardonable sin.
The fortune of a new word is made when it answers to a class of men or things which otherwise could not be described without periphrasis.
One of the most important rules in the science of manners is that you preserve an almost absolute silence concerning yourself. Play the comedy, some day, of speaking of your own interests to ordinary acquaintances, and you will see feigned attention swiftly followed by indifference, and then by weariness, until every one has found a pretext for leaving you. But if you wish to group about you the sympathies of all, and to be considered a charming and agreeable fellow, talk to them of themselves, seek some way of bringing each into action in turn; then they will smile at you, think well of you, and praise you when you are gone.
There is no ease in the gestures of a soulless woman.
Instincts are implacable. If we disobey them we are punished. There is one in particular which the animal obeys unhesitatingly: it is the one which commands us to avoid the person who has once injured us, whether the injury was intentional or accidental. The creature that has harmed us once will be always harmful: whatever his rank may be, however nearly he may be related to us, break with him at once; he is an envoy of our evil genius.
Prudence consists in never threatening; in facilitating an enemy’s retreat; in not treading, as the proverb has it, on the serpent’s tail; and in avoiding, as one would a murder, an injury to the self-esteem of an inferior. However damaging to one’s interest an act may be, in the long run it is overlooked and explained in a thousand different ways; but wounded pride bleeds always, and never forgives.
When two people are constantly together, hatred and love grow apace; every moment brings a new reason for stronger affection or increased detestation.