Madame de Stael

The human mind always makes progress, but it is a progress in spirals.

The mystery of existence is the connection between our faults and our misfortunes.

Men err from selfishness; women because they are weak.

Speech happens to not be his language.

When a noble life has prepared for old age, it is not decline that it reveals, but the first days of immortality.

Wit lies in recognizing the resemblance among things which differ and the difference between things which are alike.

A man must know how to fly in the face of opinion; a woman to submit to it.

Genius is essentially creative; it bears the stamp of the individual who possesses it.

The sense of this word among the Greeks affords the noblest definition of it; enthusiasm signifies God in us.

Innocence in genius, and candor in power, are both noble qualities.

Search for the truth is the noblest occupation of man; its publication is a duty.

Prayer is more than meditation. In meditation, the source of strength is one's self. When one prays, he goes to a source of strength greater than his own.

A religious life is a struggle and not a hymn.

To be totally understanding makes one very indulgent.

Wit consists in knowing the resemblance of things that differ, and the difference of things that are alike.

That past which is so presumptuously brought forward as a precedent for the present, was itself founded on some past that went before it.

Love is a symbol of eternity. It wipes out all sense of time, destroying all memory of a beginning and all fear of an end.

Love is the whole history of a woman's life, it is but an episode in a man's.

Scientific progress makes moral progress a necessity; for if man's power is increased, the checks that restrain him from abusing it must be strengthened.

The desire of the man is for the woman, but the desire of the woman is for the desire of the man.

The greatest happiness is to transform one's feelings into action.

The voice of conscience is so delicate that it is easy to stifle it; but it is also so clear that it is impossible to mistake it.

Sow good services: sweet remembrances will grow from them.

The more I see of men the more I like dogs.

We cease loving ourselves if no one loves us.