The study of beauty is a duel in which the artist cries with terror before being defeated. – Charles Baudelaire
I have to confess that I had gambled on my soul and lost it with heroic insouciance and lightness of touch. The soul is so impalpable, so often useless, and sometimes such a nuisance, that I felt no more emotion on losing it than if, on a stroll, I had mislaid my visiting card. – Charles Baudelaire
This life is a hospital in which every patient is possessed with a desire to change his bed. – Charles Baudelaire
Any healthy man can go without food for two days – but not without poetry. – Charles Baudelaire
But every great scripture, whether Hebrew, Indian, Persian, or Chinese, apart from its religious value will be found to have some rare and special beauty of its own and in this respect the original Bible stands very high as a monument of sublime poetry and of artistic prose. – Lafcadio Hearn