Nothing is so discreet as a young face, for nothing is less mobile; it has the serenity, the surface smoothness, and the freshness of a lake. There i… - Honoré de Balzac

One of the obligations which a historian of manners must never fail to do is not to spoil the truth by apparently dramatic arrangements, especially when the truth has taken the trouble to become romantic. Social nature, especially in Paris, involves such chances, such capricious entanglements of conjectures, that the imagination of inventors is at all times exceeded. The boldness of truth amounts to combinations forbidden in art — that is how improbable or indecent they are — unless the writer softens them, appeases them, castrates them.

Affreuse condition de l'homme ! Il n'y a pas un de ses bonheurs qui ne vienne d'une ignorance quelconque.

What is a child, monsieur, but the image of two beings, the fruit of two sentiments spontaneously blended?