401 Quotes by Joseph Joubert

Figure, movement. Everything happens, says Pascal, from figure and movement. To say in this case that everything happens from movement, for every figure is no more than the lingering trace of a movement that has already ceased. Thus the letters that I am forming now, for example, are only the pen's lingering trace of the movement of my hand.

Imagination is the eye of the soul.

Power makes you attractive; it even makes women love old men.

We always believe God is like ourselves, the indulgent think him indulgent and the stern, terrible.

A thought is a thing as real as a cannonball.

Haughty people seem to me to have, like the dwarfs, the stature of a child and the face of a man.

A part of kindness consists in loving people more than they deserve.

Everything that is exact is short.

The last word should be the last word. It is like a finishing touch given to color; there is nothing more to add. But what precaution is needed in order not to put the last word first.