573 Quotes by Charles Baudelaire

The cannon thunders - limbs fly in all directions - one can hear the groans of victims and the howling of those performing the sacrifice - it's Humanity in search of happiness

On the vaporization and the centralization of the Self. All is there.

There is no such thing as a long piece of work, except one that you dare not start.

What a mysterious faculty is that queen of the faculties!

With wine, poetry, or virtue as you choose. But get drunk.

All which is beautiful and noble is the result of reason and calculation.

An oasis of horror in a desert of boredom.

The idea of beauty which man creates for himself imprints itself on his whole attire, crumples or stiffens his dress, rounds off or squares his gesture, and in the long run even ends by subtly penetrating the very features of his face. Man ends by looking like his ideal self. These engravings can be translated either into beauty or ugliness; in one direction, they become caricatures, in the other, antique statues.

The pleasure we derive from the representation of the present is due, not only to the beauty it can be clothed in, but also to its essential quality of being the present.