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Honoré de Balzac Quotes
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We exaggerate misfortune and happiness alike. We are never as bad off or as happy as we say we are.
Honoré de Balzac
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Nothing so fortifies a friendship as a belief on the part of one friend that he is superior to the other.
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When women love us, they forgive us everything, even our crimes; when they do not love us, they give us credit for nothing, not even for our virtues.
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Passion is universal humanity. Without it religion, history, romance and art would be useless.
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Power is not revealed by striking hard or often, but by striking true.
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A lover has all the virtues and all the defects that a husband has not.
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In music, instruments perform the functions of the colors employed in painting.
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The endless legacy of the past to the present is the secret source of human genius.
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It is easier for a woman to be a good wife than a good mother. A widow has two duties with contrary obligations: she is a mother and she must exercise paternal authority. Few woman are strong enough to understand and to play this role.
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Virtue, my pet, is an abstract idea, varying in its manifestations with the surroundings. Virtue in Provence, in Constantinople, in London, and in Paris bears very different fruit, but is none the less virtue.
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When two beings are united by love, all social conventionalities are suspended.
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Too great a display of delicacy can and does sometimes infringe upon decency.
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Tone is light in another shape. In music, instruments perform the functions of the colours employed in painting.
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Power does not consist in striking with force or with frequency, but in striking true.
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A man must be a fool, who does not succeed in making a woman believe that which flatters her.
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He drew out the most delicious thin watch that Breguet had ever made. 'Fancy, it is eleven o'clock, I was up early'.
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Perhaps it is only human nature to inflict suffering on anything that will endure suffering, whether by reason of its genuine humility, or indifference, or sheer helplessness.
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Weak souls are capable of only weak sentiments; strong souls of powerful sentiments.
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When all that is fond in our nature is most thoroughly awakened, when we feel most deeply and tenderly — even then, love is so conscious of its instability that we are irresistibly prompted to ask: Do you love me? Will you love me always?
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A weapon is anything that can serve to wound; and sentiments are perhaps the most cruel weapons man can employ to wound his fellow man.
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A husband who submits to his wife's yoke is justly held an object of ridicule. A woman's influence ought to be entirely concealed.
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If we study Nature attentively in its great evolutions as in its minutest works, we cannot fail to recognize the possibility of enchantment — giving to that word its exact significance. Man does not create forces; he employs the only force that exists and which includes all others, namely Motion, the breath incomprehensible of the sovereign Maker of the universe.
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Marriage must constantly fight against a monster which devours everything: routine.
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If youth were not ignorant and timid, civilization would be impossible.
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The errors of women spring, almost always, from their faith in the good, or their confidence in the true.
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Quote of the day
To stop the flow of music would be like the stopping of time itself, incredible and inconceivable.
Aaron Copland
Honoré de Balzac
Born:
May 20, 1799
Died:
August 18, 1850
(aged 51)
Bio:
Honoré de Balzac was a French novelist and playwright.
Known for:
Père Goriot (1835)
Eugénie Grandet (1833)
Cousin Bette (1846)
Illusions perdues (1837)
Colonel Chabert (1832)
Most used words:
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,
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reason
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human
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marriage
,
time
,
god
,
happiness
,
heaven
Honoré de Balzac on Wikipedia
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