573 Quotes by Charles Baudelaire

These beings have no other status, but that of cultivating the idea of beauty in their own persons, of satisfying their passions, of feeling and thinking... Contrary to what many thoughtless people seem to believe, dandyism is not even an excessive delight in clothes and material elegance. For the perfect dandy, these things are no more than the symbol of the aristocratic superiority of his mind.

Take it easy, Sadness. Settle down.

Within the bottle’s depths, the wine’s soul sang one night. Drink wine, drink poetry, drink virtue.

L’art est long, et le temps est court.

Soon we will plunge ourselves into cold shadows, and all of summer’s stunning afternoons will be gone. I already hear the dead thuds of logs below falling on the cobblestones and the lawn.

Do not look for my heart any more; the beasts have eaten it.

In this respect you, unworthy companion of my sad life, resemble the public, to whom one must never present the delicate scents that only exasperate them, but instead give them only dung, chosen with care.

God is the only being who, in order to reign, doesn’t even need to exist.

Only when we drink poison are we well.