Quotes from Victor Hugo

I met in the street a very poor young man who was in love. His hat was old, his coat worn, his cloak was out at the elbows, the water passed through his shoes, - and the stars through his soul.

Death belongs to God alone; by what right do men touch that unknown thing?

Doing nothing is happiness for children and misery for old men.

I love all men who think, even those who think otherwise than myself.

A thousand men enslaved fear one beast free.

God blesses man, not for having found but for having sought.

I didn't believe it could be so monstrous. It's wrong to be so absorbed in divine law as not to perceive human law. Death belongs to God alone. By what right do men tough that unknown thing?

Nobody loves the light like the blind man.

Man lives more by affirmation than by bread.

Blessed be Providence which has given to each his toy: the doll to the child, the child to the woman, the woman to the man, the man to the devil!

In the animal world no creature born to be a dove turns into a scavenger. This happens only among men.

The animal is ignorant of the fact that he knows. The man is aware of the fact that he is ignorant.

You have enemies? Why, it is the story of every man who has done a great deed or created a new idea.

The truth of an upright man must be accepted on his own terms. Moreover, since natures vary, we must agree that all the beauties of human excellence may be fostered by faiths that we do not share.

There is a sacred horror about everything grand. It is easy to admire mediocrity and hills; but whatever is too lofty, a genius as well as a mountain, an assembly as well as a masterpiece, seen too near, is appalling.

Like water, which heated to a hundred degrees will bear no increase of temperature, human thought attains in certain men its maximum intensity.

Jean Valjean, my brother: you belong no longer to evil, but to good. It is your soul that I am buying for you. I withdraw it from dark thoughts and from the spirit of perdition, and I give it to God!

I don't remember which philosopher it was who said: There is never any shortage of old women.

The Revolution had many of these men, proportioned to the epoch. In this old man one was conscious of a man put to the proof. Though so near to his end, he preserved all the gestures of health. In his clear glance, in his firm tone, in the robust movement of his shoulders, there was something calculated to disconcert death.

CHAPTER VI—A CHAPTER IN WHICH THEY ADORE EACH OTHER

Mas não é disto que se trata! Não é por vossa causa, povo, que nos, abolimos a pena de morte, mas por nossa causa, deputados, que podemos ser ministros; nós não queremos que a máquina da guilhotina morda as altas classes. Por isso quebramo-la. Tanto melhor se isto serve para toda a gente, mas só em nos pensamos.

Enquanto houver lugares onde seja possível a asfixia social; em outras palavras, e de um ponto de vista mais amplo ainda, enquanto sobre a terra houver ignorância e miséria, livros como este não serão inúteis.

The peculiar property of truth is never to commit excesses. What need has it of exaggeration? There is that which it is necessary to destroy, and there is that which it is simply necessary to elucidate and examine. What a force is kindly and serious examination! Let us not apply a flame where only a light is required.

a, pour chacun de nous, de certains parallélismes entre notre intelligence, nos moeurs et notre caractère, qui se développent sans discontinuité, et ne se rompent qu'aux grandes perturbations de la vie.