To receive applause for works which do not demand all our powers hinders our advance towards a perfecting of our spirit. It usually means that thereafter we stand still.

Just as the performance of the vilest and most wicked deeds requires spirit and talent, so even the greatest demand a certain insensitivity which under other circumstances we would call stupidity.

There exists a species of transcendental ventriloquism by means of which men can be made to believe that something said on earth comes from Heaven.

Men still have to be governed by deception.

With a pen in my hand I have successfully stormed bulwarks from which others armed with sword and excommunication have been repulsed.

If all else fails, the character of a man can be recognized by nothing so surely as by a jest which he takes badly.