Pour écrire l’histoire de sa vie, il faut d’abord avoir vécu ; aussi n’est-ce pas la mienne que j’écris. - Alfred de Musset

As all the perfumes of the vanished day
Rise from the earth still moistened with the dew
So from my chastened soul beneath thy ray
Old love is born anew.

Romanticism is the abuse of adjectives

All men are liars, fickle, chatterers, hypocrites, proud or cowardly, despicable, sensual ; all women faithless, tricky, vain, inquisitive, and depraved. The world is only a bottomless cesspool, where the most shapeless sea-beasts climb and writhe on mountains of slime. But there is in the world a thing holy and sublime — the union of two of these beings, imperfect and frightful as they are. One is often deceived in love, often wounded, often unhappy ; but one loves, and on the brink of the grave one turns to look back and says : I have suffered often, sometimes I have been mistaken, but I have loved. It is I who have lived, and not a spurious being bred of my pride and my sorrow