Andre Gide

The most decisive actions of life are most often unconsidered actions.

I owe much to my friends; but, all things considered, it strikes me that I owe even more to my enemies. The real person springs life under a sting even better than under a caress.

Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.

To read a writer is for me not merely to get an idea of what he says, but to go off with him and travel in his company.

What another would have done as well as you, do not do it. What another would have said as well as you, do not say it; what another would have written as well, do not write it. Be faithful to that which exists nowhere but in yourself-and thus make yourself indispensable.

It is only in adventure that some people succeed in knowing themselves - in finding themselves.

What would there be in a story of happiness? Only what prepares it, only what destroys it can be told.

Nothing prevents happiness like the memory of happiness.

The most gifted natures are perhaps also the most trembling.

Art begins with resistance - at the point where resistance is overcome. No human masterpiece has ever been created without great labor.

Know thyself. A maxim as pernicious as it is ugly. Whoever studies himself arrest his own development. A caterpillar who seeks to know himself would never become a butterfly.

It is unthinkable for a Frenchman to arrive at middle age without having syphilis and the Cross of the Legion of Honor.