French Aphorists

"The old fish-faced actress always tries to talk to you against the light. (February 13, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 234)"

"They are a dry tree that is just waiting for other people's leaves. (March 5, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 236)"

"dormers look like the square eyes of rooftops. (March 5, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 236)"

"I don't know if it is possible to correct one's own faults, but I do know that one can be disgusted by one's own qualities especially when one finds them in others. (March 10, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 236)"

"Your page on autumn must give you the same pleasure as walking on dead leaves. (March 10, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 236)"

"Imagine life without death. Out of desperation, people would try to kill themselves every day. (March 13, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 236)"

"Some friends distrust us as if they believe that we know the depths of their souls. (March 13, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 236)"

"I have a forehead like hydrocephalus, and my ideas disappear every moment underwater. Then they come back to the surface like the drowned. (March 21, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 236)"

"Sometimes I don't have blood in my veins except to get bad blood. (March 24, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 237)"

"I don't bend, but I break. (June 19, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 238)"

"The truth I pulled up from my well can't get out of its chain. (June 19, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 239)"

"People don't talk about me anymore except in relation to others. (June 27, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 239)"

"To be happy is to be envied. Now there's always someone who envies us. It's a matter of finding out. (July 1, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 239)"

"equality is the utopia of envy. Yes, but we will suppress it by suppressing the reasons for our pride. (August 7, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 239)"

"The peasants do not envy the owner of the castle: but they envy the neighbor who has made his fortune. (August 9, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 239)"

"Continuous work is as stupid as continuous rest. (August 16, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 241)"

"Our dream bumps against the mystery like a wasp against a glass. Less merciful than man, God never opens the window. (August 16, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 241)"

"To romanticize a peasant is almost an insult to his misery. The peasant has no history, or at least no story from a novel. (September 12, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 241)"

"Every moment I turn off and on again. My soul is full of unlit matches. (September 18, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 242)"

"The sun rises before me, but I lie down after him. We are tied and drawn. (September 24, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 242)"

"I am envious in nature, but I have never had the patience to be ambitious. (October 9, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 242)"

"My books are so far removed from me that I am already a kind of posterity to them. This is my precise judgment: I will never read them again. (November 29, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 245)"

"The bat flies with its rain cover. (December 1, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 245)"

"You Must Not Love Shakespeare then very late, when one has a disgust for perfection. (December 4, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 246)"

"A journal editor will give you a good hour to explain why he doesn't have time to read your manuscript. But at least he had that hour to read it. (December 10, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 247)"

"Eulogy funeral. Half of this praise would have sufficed for him when he was alive. (December 16, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 248)"

"A socialist independent to the point of not being afraid to make luxuries. (December 19, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 248)"

"The year has too long an agony. You are sad on December 20, and on the 31st you don't notice that the year dies. (December 20, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 248)"

"The penguin with the tips of its wings in its waistcoat pocket. (December 22, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 248)"

"To have the dreams light asleep with eyes full of moon. (December 27, C.E.1906; Vergani, p. 248)"

"A man of character does not have a good character. (January 2, C.E.1907; Vergani, p. 249)"

"As soon as I happen to work a little, I immediately believe that everything is due to me and the slightest annoyance seems to me an injustice. (January 4, C.E.1907; p. 249)"

"Experience is a useful gift that serves no purpose. (January 8, C.E.1907; Vergani, p. 249)"

"Native country, mortal country. (June 19, C.E.1907; Vergani, p. 252)"

"The country of birth is all here: a minute of emotion every now and then, but not always. (August 10, C.E.1907; Vergani, p. 253)"

"Never be satisfied: art is all here."

""I don't get involved in politics" is like saying "I don't deal with life". , ilsole24ore.com."

"When I think of all the books I have left to read, I am sure that I am still happy."

"If you want to win the sympathy of women tell them the things you wouldn't want men to say to your wife."

"Baudelaire: his heavy phrase, loaded with electric fluids. (C.E.1887; Vergani, p. 11)"

"If even the slightest truth could come out of a discussion, there would be less discussion. Nothing is more depressing than understanding each other: once you have understood each other, there is nothing more to say to each other. (October 24, C.E.1887; Vergani, p. 12)"

"The most beautiful pages about the campaign are written in the middle of the city. (November 25, C.E.1887; Vergani, p. 13)"

"Work thinks, laziness dreams. It has its own very bad way of being good. (December 27, C.E.1887; Vergani, p. 13)"

"How many people wanted to kill themselves and instead limited themselves to tearing up their photographs! (December 29, C.E.1888; Vergani, p. 15)"

"Depicts the ideal of calm with the image of a cat sitting. (January 30, C.E.1889; Vergani, p. 16)"

"The most stupid exaggeration is that of tears. It's as annoying as a faucet that won't close. (March 29, C.E.1889; p. 17)"

"Horror of the bourgeois is a bourgeois attitude. (April 10, 1889; Vergani, p. 18)"

"Do we have a destiny? How boring not to know! How boring it would be if you knew! (January 14, C.E.1889; Vergani, p. 19)"

"The sleep is the square of memories. Help their return. (August 30, C.E.1889; Vergani, p. 21)"

"I love men more or less, depending on the amount of annotations I can get out of them. (November 25, C.E.1889; Vergani, p. 32)"