“My God! I have often regretted that I was born! I have often wished to fall back even into nothingness, rather than advance through so many falsehoods, so many sufferings, and so many successive losses, towards that loss of ourselves which we call death!”

Original: Mon Dieu! J'ai souvent regretté d'être né! J'ai souvent souhaité retomber même dans le néant, plutôt que d'avancer à travers tant de mensonges, tant de souffrances et tant de pertes successives, vers cette perte de nous-mêmes que nous appelons la mort! — An honest cry of existential weariness that still affirms the value of family bonds and simple affections. · Les Confidences, 1849 (French)

• Death
• Family
• Suffering

“The more I see of the representatives of the people, the more I admire my dogs.”

Original: Plus je vois les représentants du peuple, plus j'admire mes chiens. — A wry, private jab at political assemblies that prefers the loyalty of animals to the conduct of deputies. · Reported in a letter of Count d'Orsay to John Forster, 1850 (French, as commonly transmitted)

• Animals
• Irony
• Politics

“To love in order to be loved is human; but to love for the sake of loving is almost angelic.”

Original: Aimer pour être aimé, c’est de l’homme; mais aimer pour aimer c’est presque de l’ange. — Distinguishes self-interested affection from a purer, disinterested love that approaches the divine. · Graziella, 1852 (French)

• Humanity
• Ideal
• Love