Gustave Flaubert

"The heart knows secrets the mind will never understand."

"One should live as if one will die tomorrow and learn as if one will live forever."

"In every mediocre soul there lives the ghost of a great one."

"The only true luxury is time."

"We forget the things we should remember and remember the things we should forget."

"A word poorly chosen can destroy a friendship or topple a kingdom."

"The pursuit of perfection is the enemy of the good."

"Every man carries within him the seed of his own destruction."

"The artist must be in his work as God is in creation, invisible yet all-powerful."

"To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost."

"The one way to tolerate existence is to lose oneself in literature."

"Man's life is a poor thing unless his soul is lifted by some ideal."

"I love my country, but I do not love my countrymen."

"The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of."

"Writing is like prostitution. First you do it for love, then for a few friends, finally for money."

"One should as a rule respect public opinion in so far as is necessary to avoid starvation and to preserve one's liberty."

"The secret of all beauty is truth."

"Mediocrity is the best policy."

"Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body."

"Do not read, as children do, to amuse yourself, nor as the ambitious do, to instruct yourself. No, read in order to live."

"Everything is interesting if you look at it from the right perspective."

"The most glorious moments in your life are not the so-called days of success, but rather those days when out of dejection and despair you felt a deep resolve take birth in you."

"One should never forbid what one lacks the power to prevent."

"Farming looks mighty easy when your plough is a pencil and you're a thousand miles from the corn field."

"The capacity to wonder has been called the root of all philosophy."

"I am always irritated by the statement that there are no stupid questions. There absolutely are stupid questions."

"The pen is a formidable instrument; it has created more revolutions than gunpowder."

"Success in literature is the reward of hard labor and indefatigable perseverance."

"That is the secret of true culture. It does not consist in acquiring a great number of facts."

"There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are either well written or badly written."