The young rich man has a hundred brilliant and unrefined distractions, horse racing, hunting, tobacco, cards, nice lunches and all that; occupations for the lower part of the soul and procure damage to the delicate and higher part. The young pauper fights to get his bread; he eats and once eaten he has nothing but meditation.
A ferocious ego: there is the envious man.
There are men who would pay to be bribed.
Marriage is like grafting ; it may succeed or not.
Those who live are those who fight.
I met in the street a very poor young man who was in love. His hat was old, his coat worn, his cloak was out at the elbows, the water passed through his shoes, and the stars through his soul.
At the moment when the horror of the scene was at its height, a demoniacal laugh, a laugh that can only come from one who has lost all semblance of humanity, burst from the livid lips of the priest. Quasimodo did not hear that laugh, but he saw it. Retreating a few paces behind the Archdeacon, the hunchback suddenly made a rush at him, and with his two great hands against Dom Claude's back, thrust him furiously into the abyss over which he had been leaning.
The priest screamed "Damnation!" and fell. (from "Notre Dame de Paris")
The really great writers are those whose thought occupies all the angles and the folds of their style.
There are thoughts which are prayers. There are moments when, whatever the posture of the body, the soul is on its knees.
He who opens a school door, closes a prison.