“A man may meet a woman and be shocked by her ugliness. Soon, if she is natural and unaffected, her expression makes him overlook the faults of her features. He begins to find her charming, it enters his head that… — Stendhal Copy Share Image
At a distance, we cannot conceive of the authority of a despot who knows all his subjects on sight. — Stendhal Copy Share
The pleasures and the cares of the luckiest ambition, even of limitless power, are nothing next to the intimate happiness that tenderness and love… — Stendhal Copy Share
The more a race is governed by its passions, the less it has acquired the habit of cautious and reasoned argument, the more intense… — Stendhal Copy Share
The tyranny of public opinion (and what an opinion!) is as fatuous in the small towns of France as it is in the United… — Stendhal Copy Share
In love, unlike most other passions, the recollection of what you have had and lost is always better than what you can hope for… — Stendhal Copy Share
“The footman burst in, announcing, 'Monsieur le Duc de ---.' 'Hold your tongue, you fool,' said the Duke as he entered the room. He… — Stendhal Copy Share
“If you think of paying court to those in power, your eternal ruin is assured.” — Stendhal Copy Share
Your career will be a painful one. I divine something in you which offends the vulgar. — Stendhal Copy Share
A forty-year-old woman is only something to men who have loved her in her youth. — Stendhal Copy Share
Perhaps men who cannot love passionately are those who feel the effect of beauty most keenly; at any rate this is the strongest impression… — Stendhal Copy Share
Who knows whether it is not true that phosphorus and mind are not the same thing? — Stendhal Copy Share
“Could anything possibly be more humorous than believing in the depth or in the depravity of the Parisian character?” — Stendhal Copy Share
