Quotes from Jules Renard

Socialism must come down from the brain and reach the heart.

We are ignorant of the Beyond because this ignorance is the condition of our own life. Just as ice cannot know fire except by melting and vanishing.

If I had my life to live over again, I would ask that not a thing be changed, but that my eyes be opened wider.

Be modest! It is the kind of pride least likely to offend.

The strong do not hesitate. They settle down, they sweat, they go on to the end. They exhaust the ink, they use up the paper.

Failure is not our only punishment for laziness; there is also the success of others.

The danger of success is that it makes us forget the world's dreadful injustice.

The less I understand life, the more I live it!

A beautiful line of verse has twelve feet, and two wings.

We spend our lives talking about this mystery. Our life.

It doesn't pay to say too much when you are mad enough to choke. For the word that stings the deepest is the word that is never spoke, Let the other fellow wrangle till the storm has blown away, then he'll do a heap of thinking about the things you didn't say.

Words are the coins making up the currency of sentences, and there are always too many small coins.

Man who waits for roast duck to fly into mouth must wait very, very long time.

I finally know what distinguishes man from the other beasts: financial worries.

Talent is a matter of quantity. Talent does not write on page, it writes three hundred.

To succeed you must add water to your wine, until there is no more wine.

Writing is the best way to talk without being interrupted.

The only man who is really free is the one who can turn down an invitation to dinner without giving an excuse.

I finally know what distinguishes man from the other beasts: financial worries.

It is easy for a somebody to be modest, but it is difficult to be modest when one is a nobody.

Failure is not our only punishment for laziness: there is also the success of others.

I am never bored anywhere: being bored is an insult to oneself.