Small natures require despotism to exercise their sinews, as great souls thirst for equality to give play to their heart.

There are no little events with the heart. It magnifies everything; it places in the same scales the fall of an empire of fourteen years and the dropping of a woman's glove, and almost always the glove weighs more than the empire.

Great love affairs start with Champagne and end with tisane.

There is no such thing as a great talent without great will power.

Behind every great fortune lies a great crime.

It is the mark of a great man that he puts to flight all ordinary calculations. He is at once sublime and touching, childlike and of the race of giants.