There are in every man, at all times, two simultaneous tendencies, one toward God, the other toward Satan. - Charles Baudelaire

Relate comic things in pompous fashion. Irregularity, in other words the unexpected, the surprising, the astonishing, are essential to and characteristic of beauty. Two fundamental literary qualities: supernaturalism and irony. The blend of the grotesque and the tragic are attractive to the mind, as is discord to blasé ears. Imagine a canvas for a lyrical, magical farce, for a pantomime, and translate it into a serious novel. Drown the whole thing in an abnormal, dreamy atmosphere, in the atmosphere of great days … the region of pure poetry.

I am unable to understand how a man of honor could take a newspaper in his hands without a shudder of disgust.

Evil happens without effort, naturally, inevitably; good is always the product of skill.