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Honoré de Balzac quotes

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“Some day you will find out that there is far more happiness in another's happiness than in your own.” Honoré de Balzac, Father Goriot
“Our heart is a treasury; if you pour out all its wealth at once, you are bankrupt.” Honoré de Balzac, Father Goriot
“If youth were not ignorant and timid, civilization would be impossible.” Honoré de Balzac, Father Goriot
“Do you know how a man makes his way here? By brilliant genius or by skilful corruption. You must either cut your way through these masses of men like a cannon ball, or steal among them like a plague.” Honoré de Balzac, Father Goriot
“Death unites as well as separates; it silences all paltry feeling.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“A flow of words is a sure sign of duplicity.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“Happiness is the poetry of woman, as the toilette is her tinsel.” Honoré de Balzac, Father Goriot
“Excess of joy is harder to bear than any amount of sorrow.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“Wisdom is the understanding of celestial things to which the Spirit is brought by Love.” Honoré de Balzac, Séraphîta
“Such is life. It is no cleaner than a kitchen; it reeks like a kitchen; and if you mean to cook your dinner, you must expect to soil your hands; the real art is in getting them clean again, and therein lies the whole morality of our epoch.” Honoré de Balzac, Father Goriot
“Perhaps it is only human nature to inflict suffering on anything that will endure suffering, whether by reason of its genuine humility, or indifference, or sheer helplessness.” Honoré de Balzac, Father Goriot
“A mother, who is really a mother, is never free.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“Therefore it is that man dies in despair while the Spirit dies in ecstasy.” Honoré de Balzac, Séraphîta
“Remorse is impotence, impotence which sins again. Repentance alone is powerful; it ends all.” Honoré de Balzac, Séraphîta
“A husband who submits to his wife's yoke is justly held an object of ridicule. A woman's influence ought to be entirely concealed.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“Worse than all, you are candid, and it often happens that our happiness depends on certain social hypocrisies to which you will never stoop.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“Love may be or it may not, but where it is, it ought to reveal itself in its immensity.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“The man as he converses is the lover; silent, he is the husband.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“A mother's happiness is like a beacon, lighting up the future, but reflected also on the past in the guise of fond memories.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“The fact is that love is of two kinds—one which commands, and one which obeys. The two are quite distinct, and the passion to which the one gives rise is not the passion of the other.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“Courtesy is only a thin veneer on the general selfishness.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“Children, dear and loving children, can alone console a woman for the loss of her beauty.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“A mother's life, you see, is one long succession of dramas, now soft and tender, now terrible. Not an hour but has its joys and fears.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“There is an element in friendship which doubles its charm and renders it indissoluble—a sense of certainty which is lacking in love.” Honoré de Balzac, Lost Illusions
“Society bristles with enigmas which look hard to solve. It is a perfect maze of intrigue.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“It is only in the act of nursing that a woman realizes her motherhood in visible and tangible fashion; it is a joy of every moment.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“The art of motherhood involves much silent, unobtrusive self-denial, an hourly devotion which finds no detail too minute.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“Conscience, my dear fellow, is a stick which every one takes up to beat his neighbor and not for application to his own back.” Honoré de Balzac, Lost Illusions
“The human heart may find here and there a resting-place short of the highest height of affection, but we seldom stop in the steep, downward slope of hatred.” Honoré de Balzac, Father Goriot
“Chance, my dear, is the sovereign deity in child-bearing.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“In a word, suppressing feelings in order to live to a ripe old age, or dying young by accepting the martyrdom of passion, that is our destiny.” Honoré de Balzac, The Wild Ass’s Skin
“It is the mark of a great man that he puts to flight all ordinary calculations. He is at once sublime and touching, childlike and of the race of giants.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“Most of us spend a good part of our lives in clearing our minds of the notions that sprang up unchecked during our nonage. This is called 'getting our experience.'” Honoré de Balzac, Lost Illusions

Related topics

love happiness woman passion joy mother death heart youth society silence hypocrisy corruption conscience motherhood conversation influence husband repentance wisdom

Related sources

Letters of Two Brides (18)
Father Goriot (8)
Séraphîta (3)
Lost Illusions (3)
The Wild Ass’s Skin (1)