the first quality of an honest man is contempt for religion, which would have us afraid of the most natural thing in the world, which is death; and would have us hate the one beautiful thing destiny has given us, which is life.
It is necessary to meditate early, and often, on the art of dying to succeed later in doing it properly just once.
Thus we have on stage two men, each of whom knows nothing of what he believes the other knows, and to deceive each other reciprocally both speak in allusions, each of the two hoping (in vain) that the other holds the key to his puzzle.
All the stories I would like to write persecute me. When I am in my chamber, it seems as if they are all around me, like little devils, and while one tugs at my ear, another tweaks my nose, and each says to me, 'Sir, write me, I am beautiful.
A scoundrel is an evil heliotrope turning always in the direction of the most powerful.
But the purpose of a story is to teach and to please at once, and what it teaches is how to recognize the snares of the world.
