True kindness presupposes the faculty of imagining as one's own the suffering and joys of others. - André Gide

A land liberated from works of art. I despise those who can acknowledge beauty only when it’s already transcribed, interpreted. One thing admirable about the Arabs: they live their art, they sing and scatter it, from day to day; they don’t cling to it, they don’t embalm it in works. Which is the cause and the effect of the absence of great artists. I have always believed the great artists are the ones who dare entitle to beauty things so natural that when they’re seen afterward people say: Why did I never realize before that this too was beautiful?...

Each one of a pair of lovers fashions himself to meet the other's requirements — endeavors by a continual effort to resemble that idol of himself which he beholds in the other's heart.... Whoever really loves abandons all sincerity.

Je n'aime pas les hommes; j'aime ce qui les dévore.