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Events are never absolute, their outcome depends entirely upon the individual. Misfortune is a stepping stone for a genius, a piscina for a Christian, a treasure for a man of parts, and an abyss for a weakling.

Honore de Balzac

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Honore de Balzac
Age: 52 †
Born: 1799
Born: May 20
Died: 1851
Died: August 19
Art Critic
Dramaturge
Essayist
Journalist
Literary Critic
Novelist
Prosaist
Writer
Tours
France
Balzac
Horace de Saint- Aubin
Onoreh deh Balzaḳ
Lord R'Hoone
Ônôrē de Balzaq
Jeune ceélibataire
Onore de Balzak
Honorato De Balzac
H. Balzak
Honoreé De Balzac
H. Balzac
Horace de S.- Aubin
Honoriusz Balzac
Un Jeune ceélibataire
Lord O'Rhoone
Ūnūrīh dī Balzāk
R'Hoone
Onore de Bal'zak
Hônôrê đơ Banzăc
Honore de Balzak
de. Balzac
Events
Entirely
Stepping
Upon
Treasure
Misfortune
Christian
Absolutes
Abyss
Individual
Absolute
Outcome
Never
Stones
Misfortunes
Men
Parts
Outcomes
Depends
Stone
Genius
Certainty
Weakling

More quotes by Honore de Balzac

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Un mari, comme un gouvernement, ne doit jamais avouer de faute. A husband, like a government, never needs to admit a fault.
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Virtue is always too much of a piece and too ignorant of those shades of feeling and of temperament that enable us to squint when we are placed in a false position.
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We are never either so wretched or so happy as we say we are.
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Let passion reach a catastrophe and it submits us to an intoxicating force far more powerful than the niggardly irritation of wine or of opium. The lucidity our ideas then achieve, and the delicacy of our overly exalted sensations, produce the strangest and most unexpected effects.
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Our greatest fears lie in anticipation.
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Bureaucracy is a giant mechanism operated by pygmies.
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Our most bitter enemies are our own kith and kin. Kings have no brothers, no sons, no mother!
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For pain is perhaps but a violent pleasure? Who could determine the point where pleasure becomes pain, where pain is still a pleasure? Is not the utmost brightness of the ideal world soothing to us, while the lightest shadows of the physical world annoy?
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Prostitution and robbery are two living protests, respectively female and male, made by the natural state against the social state.
Honore de Balzac
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A beautiful book is a victory won in all the battlefields of human thought.
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In intimate family life, there comes a moment when children, willingly or no, become the judges of their parents.
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To speak of love is to make love.
Honore de Balzac
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Envy lurks at the bottom of the human heart like a viper in its hole.
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Carelessness in dressing is moral suicide.
Honore de Balzac
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Most women wish to feel that their spirit has been violated. Do they not, indeed, flatter themselves on never yielding save to force?
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What makes friendship indissolute and what doubles its charms is a feeling we find lacking in love: I mean certitude.
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Man's condition is horrible because, no matter what form his happiness may take, it arises from some species of ignorance.
Honore de Balzac
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A husband and wife who are in the habit of occupying separate rooms are either beings apart, or they have found happiness. Either they hate or they adore each other.
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It's not enough to be a good person. You also have to show it.
Honore de Balzac
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Woman has this in common with angels, that suffering beings belong especially to her.
Honore de Balzac