"Love is free: to promise for ever to love the same woman, is not less absurd than to promise to believe the same creed: such a vow in both cases, excludes us from all enquiry."

"I never met a man who wasn't a beast in comparison to him."

"A poet is a nightingale who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds."

"I am an atheist, a republican, and a lover of mankind."

"I am a moral, a religious, and a political bigot. I am for the most rigorous morality, the most fervent religion, and the most uncompromising politics."