Title: Quotes and Images from the Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
Author: Giacomo Casanova
Editor: David Widger
Translator: Arthur Machen
Release date: August 26, 2004 [eBook #7538]
Most recently updated: December 17, 2022
Language: English
Credits: David Widger
A man never argues well except when his purse is well filled Accepted the compliment for what it was worth Accomplice of the slanderer Advantages of a great sorrow is that nothing else seems painful Age, that cruel and unavoidable disease All women, dear Leah are for sale All-powerful lever, gold Alms given in public are sure to be accompanied by vanity Anger and reason do not belong to the same family Angry man always thinks himself right At my age I could not be allowed to have any opinions Augurs could never look at each other without laughing Awkward or miserly, and therefore unworthy of love Axiom that "neglected right is lost right" Beauty is the only unpardonable offence in your eyes Beauty without wit offers love nothing Bed is a capital place to get an appetite Best plan in this world is to be astonished at nothing Beware of the man of one book Calumnies are easy to utter but hard to refute Cherishing my grief Clever man deceives by telling the truth Commissaries of Chastity Confession Contempt of life Could tell a good story without laughing Criticism only grazed the skin and never wounded deeply Delights are in proportion to the privations we have suffered Desire is only kept alive by being denied Desire to make a great fuss like a great man Despair which is not without some sweetness Despised ignoramus becomes an enemy Diminish the tale of your years instead of increasing it Distance is relative Divinities—novelty and singularity Do not mind people believing anything, provided it is not true Do their duty, and to live in peace and sweet ignorance Economy in pleasure is not to my taste Emotion is infectious Essence of freedom consists in thinking you have it Everything hung from an if Exercise their reason to avoid the misfortunes which they fear Fanaticism, no matter of what nature, is only the plague Fatal desire for luxury and empty show spoils all Favourite passion has always been vengeance First motive is always self-interest Foolish enough to write the truth For in the night, you know, all cats are grey For is love anything else than a kind of curiosity? Fortune flouts old age Found him greater at a distance than close at hand Gave the Cardinal de Rohan the famous necklace Girl who gave nothing must take nothing Give yourself up to whatever fate offers to you, Government ought never to destroy ancient customs abruptly Groans, and prayers, and blasphemies Happiness is purely a creature of the imagination Happiness is not lasting—nor is man Happy or unhappy from a merely cursory inspection Happy ignorance! Happy age when one’s inexperience is one’s sole misfortune Hasty verses are apt to sacrifice wit to rhyme He won’t be uneasy—he is a philosopher Hobbes: of two evils choose the least Honest old man will not believe in the existence of rascals Idle questions which are commonly addressed to a traveller If this and if that, and every other if If I could live my life over again If history did not lie Ignorance is bliss Ignorant, who talk about everything right or wrong Imagine that what they feel themselves others must feel It is only fools who complain It’s too much for honour and too little for love Jealousy leads to anger, and anger goes a long way Knowing that he would not be regretted after his death Last thing which we learn in all languages is wit Laugh out of season Let not thy right hand know what thy left hand doeth Lie a sufficient number of times, one ends by believing it Light come, light go Love always makes men selfish Look on everything we don’t possess as a superfluity Love fills our minds with idle visions Love makes no conditions Made a point of forgetting everything unpleasant Made a parade of his Atheism Man needs so little to console him or to soothe his grief Marriage without enjoyment is a thorn without roses Marriage state, for which I felt I had no vocation Married a rich wife, he repented of having married at all Mere beauty does not go for much Most trifling services are assessed at the highest rates My spirit and my desires are as young as ever My time was too short to write so little Mystical insinuations Negligent attire Never to pass an opinion on any subject Never wearied himself with too much thinking Nobody read his books, but everybody agreed he was learned ‘Non’ is equal to giving the lie Now I am too old to begin curing myself Obscenity disgusts, and never gives pleasure Oh! wonderful power of self-delusion One never knows enough Owed all its merits to antithesis and paradox Pardonable weakness, most of us prefer "mine" to "thine" Passing infidelity, but not inconstancy Passion and prejudice cannot reason People did not want to know things as they truly were People want to know everything, and they invent Pigmies mimicking a giant Pity to sell cheaply what would have to be replaced dearly Pleasures are realities, though all too fleeting Pope, whom no Roman can believe to be infallible Post-masters Prejudices which had the sanction of the law Pride is the daughter of folly Privately indulged in every luxury that he forbade to others Privilege of a nursing mother Promising everlasting constancy Proud nation, at once so great and so little Quacks Rather be your debtor than for you to be mine Read when I am gone Reading innumerable follies one finds written in such places Repentance for a good deed Reproached by his wife for the money he had expended Rid of our vices more easily than of our follies Rome the holy, which thus strives to make all men pederasts Rumour is only good to amuse fools Sad symptom of misery which is called a yawn Sadness is a disease which gives the death-blow to affection Scold and then forgive Scrupulously careful not to cheat you in small things Seldom praised and never blamed Selfishness, then, the universal motor of our actions? Shewed his contempt by saying nothing Sin concealed is half pardoned Sleep—the very likeness of non-existence Snatching from poor mortal man the delusions Soften the hardships of the slow but certain passage to the grave Stupid servant is more dangerous than a bad one ‘Sublata lucerna nullum discrimen inter feminas’ Submissive gaze of a captive who glories in his chain Surface is always the first to interest Talent of never appearing to be a learned man Taste and feeling Tell me whether that contempt of life renders you worthy of it There is no cure for death There’s time enough for that Time that is given to enjoyment is never lost Time that destroys marble and brass destroys also the very memory Time is a great teacher Timidity is often another word for stupidity To know ill is worse than not to know at all Vengeance is a divine pleasure Verses which, like parasites, steal into a funeral oration Victims of their good faith Wash their dirty linen in private What is love? When we can feel pity, we love no longer When one is in an ill humour, everything is fuel for the fire Whims of the mob and the fancies of the Republic Wife worthy of being a mistress Wiser if they were less witty Wish is father to the thought Wit cannot stand before stupidity Woman has in her tears a weapon Women are always as old as they look Women would be either tyrants or slaves Women often do the most idiotic things out of sheer obstinacy World of memories, without a present and without a future Would like to shape the laws according to their needs Wretch treats me so kindly that I love him more and more
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