Giacomo Casanova

I will begin with this confession: whatever I have done in the course of my life, whether it be good or evil, has been done freely; I am a free agent. ”

The mind of a human being is formed only of comparisons made in order to examine analogies, and therefore cannot precede the existence of memory. ”

The history of my life must begin by the earliest circumstance which my memory can evoke; it will therefore commence when I had attained the age of eight years and four months. ”

I know that I have lived because I have felt, and, feeling giving me the knowledge of my existence, I know likewise that I shall exist no more when I shall have ceased to feel. ”

God ceases to be God only for those who can admit the possibility of His non-existence, and that conception is in itself the most severe punishment they can suffer. ”

It is only necessary to have courage, for strength without self-confidence is useless. ”

In the mean time I worship God, laying every wrong action under an interdict which I endeavour to respect, and I loathe the wicked without doing them any injury. ”

I have felt in my very blood, ever since I was born, a most unconquerable hatred towards the whole tribe of fools, and it arises from the fact that I feel myself a blockhead whenever I am in their company. ”

My success and my misfortunes, the bright and the dark days I have gone through, everything has proved to me that in this world, either physical or moral, good comes out of evil just as well as evil comes out of good. ”

My errors will point to thinking men the various roads, and will teach them the great art of treading on the brink of the precipice without falling into it. ”