How did you get back?' asked Vautrin. 'I walked,' replied Eugene. 'I wouldn't like half-pleasures, myself,' observed the tempter. 'I'd want to go there in my own carriage, have my own box, and come back in comfort. All or nothing, that's my motto.' 'And a very good one,' said Madame Vauquer.
There are no little events with the heart. It magnifies everything; it places in the same scales the fall of an empire of fourteen years and the dropping of a woman's glove, and almost always the glove weighs more than the empire.
Authentic love always assumes the mystery of modesty, even in its expression, because actions speak louder than words. Unlike a feigned love, it feels no need to set a conflagration.
Rich men are resolved to be astonished at nothing. When they see a masterpiece, they must needs at one glance recognize some flaw to dispense them from admiration, a vulgar emotion.
Religious ecstasy is a madness of thought freed of its bodily bonds, whereas in the ecstasy of love, the forces of twin natures unite, blend and embrace one another.