Victor Hugo Quotes
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What is fright by night is curiosity by day.
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Men hate those to whom they have to lie.
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France lost a great novel last night.
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I'd like a drink. I desire to forget life. Life is a hideous invention by somebody I don't know. It doesn't last, and it's good for nothing. You break your neck simply living.
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But alas, if I have not maintained my victory, it is God's fault for not making man and the devil of equal strength.
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Loving is half of believing.
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The earth is a great piece of stupidity.
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God has set his intentions in the flowers, in the dawn, in the spring, it is his will that we should love.
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There is always more misery among the lower classes than there is humanity in the higher.
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Let us fear the worst, but work with faith; the best will always take care of itself.
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We shall look on crime as a disease, and its physicians shall displace the judges, its hospitals displace the Galleys. Liberty and health shall be alike. We shall pour balm and oil where we formerly applied iron and fire; evil will be treated in charity, instead of in anger. This change will be simple and sublime.
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Marius and Cosette did not ask where this would lead them. They looked at themselves as arrived. It is a strange pretension for men to ask that love should lead them somewhere.
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A translation in verse . . . seems to me something absurd, impossible.
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Most commonly revolt is born of material circumstances; but insurrection is always a moral phenomenon. Revolt is Masaniello, who led the Neapolitan insurgents in 1647; but insurrection is Spartacus. Insurrection is a thing of the spirit, revolt is a thing of the stomach.
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I have examined the death penalty under each of its two aspects: as a direct action, and as an indirect one. What does it come down to? Nothing but something horrible and useless, nothing but a way of shedding blood that is called a crime when an individual commits it, but is sadly called "justice" when society brings it about. Make no mistake, you lawmakers and judges, in the eyes of God as in those of conscience, what is a crime when individuals do it is no less an offense when society commits the deed.
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A bit of mould is a pleiad of flowers; a nebula is an ant-hill of stars.
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She was a lovely blonde, with fine teeth. She had gold and pearls for her dowry; but her gold was on her head, and her pearls were in her mouth.
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In every cradle decked with rosy wreath Lurk germs of death.
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Astronomy, that micography of heaven, is the most magnificent of the sciences. ... Astronomy has its clear side and its luminous side; on its clear side it is tinctured with algebra, on its luminous side with poetry.
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When two mouths, made sacred by love, draw near to each other to create, it is impossible, that above that ineffable kiss there should not be a thrill in the immense mystery of the stars.
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No matter who you are, the thought of so much suffering and degradation must cause you to shudder at the sight of a veil or cassock, those two shrouds of human invention.
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And if it happened to be a Christmas-night when the great bell seemed to rattle in its throat as it called the faithful to the midnight mass, there was such an indescribable air of life spread over the sombre facade that the great door-way looked as if it were swallowing the entire crowd, and the rose-window staring at them.
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It may be remarked in passing that success is an ugly thing. Men are deceived by its false resemblences to merit.
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To live a life which is a perpetual falsehood is to suffer unknown tortures.