Quotes By Victor Hugo

Architecture has recorded the great ideas of the human race. Not only every religious symbol, but every human thought has its page in that vast book.

When a man is out of sight, it is not too long before he is out of mind.

Freedom in art, freedom in society, this is the double goal towards which all consistent and logical minds must strive.

Reaction - a boat which is going against the current but which does not prevent the river from flowing on.

It is the end. But of what? The end of France? No. The end of kings? Yes.

Smallness in a great man seems smaller by its disproportion with all the rest.

To love is to act.

The word is the Verb, and the Verb is God.

One can resist the invasion of an army but one cannot resist the invasion of ideas.

A compliment is something like a kiss through a veil.

A mother's arms are made of tenderness and children sleep soundly in them.

A library implies an act of faith.

Taste is the common sense of genius.

Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent.

Virtue has a veil, vice a mask.

The greatest happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved; loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves.

The flesh is the surface of the unknown.

Civil war? What does that mean? Is there any foreign war? Isn't every war fought between men, between brothers?

The soul has illusions as the bird has wings: it is supported by them.

It is nothing to die. It is frightful not to live.

There are thoughts which are prayers. There are moments when, whatever the posture of the body, the soul is on its knees.

Everything being a constant carnival, there is no carnival left.

A creditor is worse than a slave-owner; for the master owns only your person, but a creditor owns your dignity, and can command it.

Indigestion is charged by God with enforcing morality on the stomach.

What a grand thing, to be loved! What a grander thing still, to love!

Almost all our desires, when examined, contain something too shameful to reveal.

Greater than the tread of mighty armies is an idea whose time has come.

One sees qualities at a distance and defects at close range.

The supreme happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved; loved for ourselves, or rather in spite of ourselves.

Those who live are those who fight.