I don't know what a scoundrel is like, but I know what a respectable man is like, and it's enough to make one's flesh creep.

Genius is a grace. The true man of genius acts by movement or by impulsion.

It is one of man's curious idiosyncrasies to create difficulties for the pleasure of resolving them.

Man in general, if reduced to himself, is too wicked to be free.

I don't know what a scoundrel is like, but I know what a respectable man is like, and it's enough to make one's flesh creep.

There is no man who desires as passionately as a Russian. If we could imprison a Russian desire beneath a fortress, that fortress would explode.