Stendhal quotes - page 2

Napoleon was indeed the man sent by God to help the youth of France! Who is to take his place? (Stendhal)
It is better to have a prosaic husband and to take a romantic lover.
Stendhal
A very small degree of hope is sufficient to cause the birth of love.
Stendhal
Logic is neither an art nor a science but a dodge.
Stendhal
Power, after love, is the first source of happiness.
Stendhal
The pleasures of love are always in proportion to our fears.
Stendhal
I see but one rule: to be clear. If I am not clear, all my world crumbles to nothing.
Stendhal
In our calling, we have to choose; we must make our fortune either in this world or in the next, there is no middle way.
Stendhal
When a man leaves his mistress, he runs the risk of being betrayed two or three times daily.
Stendhal
It is with blows dealt by public contempt that a husband kills his wife in the nineteenth century; it is by shutting the doors of all the drawing-rooms in her face.
Stendhal
A strange effect of marriage, such as the nineteenth century has made it! The boredom of married life inevitably destroys love, when love has preceded marriage. And yet, as a philosopher has observed, it speedily brings about, among people who are rich enough not to have to work, an intense boredom with all quiet forms of enjoyment. And it is only dried up hearts, among women, that it does not predispose to love. (Stendhal)
Jean Jacques Rousseau," he answered, "is nothing but a fool in my eyes when he takes it upon himself to criticise society; he did not understand it, and approached it with the heart of an upstart flunkey.... For all his preaching a Republic and the overthrow of monarchical titles, the upstart is mad with joy if a Duke alters the course of his after-dinner stroll to accompany one of his friends.
Stendhal
A novel is a mirror carried along a high road. At one moment it reflects to your vision the azure skies at another the mire of the puddles at your feet. And the man who carries this mirror in his pack will be accused by you of being immoral! His mirror shews the mire, and you blame the mirror! Rather blame that high road upon which the puddle lies, still more the inspector of roads who allows the water to gather and the puddle to form.
Stendhal
War was then no longer this noble and unified outburst of souls in love with glory that he had imagined from Napoleon's proclamations.
Stendhal
Because one has little fear of shocking vanity in Italy, people adopt an intimate tone very quickly and discuss personal things.
Stendhal
A creature who is half an idiot, but who keeps a sharp look-out, and acts prudently all his life, often enjoys the pleasure of triumphing over men of imagination.
Stendhal
Wounded pride can take a rich young man far who has been surrounded by flatterers since birth.
Stendhal
Faith, I am no such fool; everyone for himself in this desert of selfishness which is called life.
Stendhal
There is no such thing as "natural law": this expression is nothing but old nonsense... Prior to laws, what is natural is only the strength of the lion, or the need of the creature suffering from hunger or cold, in short, need.
Stendhal
This religion takes away the courage of thinking of unusual things and prohibits self-examination above all as the most egregious of sins; it is a step towards protestantism.
Stendhal
Now that the steam engine rules the world, a title is an absurdity, still I am all dressed up in this title. It will crush me if I do not support it. The title attracts attention to myself. (Stendhal)
The dinner was indifferent and the conversation irritating. "It's like the table of contents of a dull book," thought Julien. "All the greatest subjects of human thought are proudly displayed in it. Listen to it for three minutes, and you ask yourself which is more striking, the emphasis of the speaker or his shocking ignorance."
Stendhal
Were I to buy this life of pleasure and this only chance at happiness with a few little dangers, where would be the harm? And wouldn't it still be fortunate to find a weak excuse to give her proof of my love?
Stendhal
Wit lasts no more than two centuries.
Stendhal
Why not make an end of it all?" he asked himself. "Why this obstinate resistance to the fate that is crushing me? It is all very well my forming what are apparently the most reasonable forms of conduct, my life is a succession of griefs and bitter feelings. This month is no better than the last; this year is no better than last year. Why this obstinate determination to go on living? Can I be wanting in firmness? What is death?" he asked himself, opening his case of pistols and examining them. "A very small matter, when all is said; only a fool would be concerned about it.
Stendhal