“I prefer thought to action, an idea to a transaction, contemplation to activity.”

— Honoré de Balzac, Louis Lambert (1832), trans. Clara Bell

About Honoré de Balzac

1799 – 1850

French novelist, author of "La Comédie humaine".

“Marriage must incessantly contend with a monster which devours everything, that is, familiarity.”

“All human power is a compound of time and patience.”

“Equality may be a right, but no power on earth can convert it into fact.”

“Any one thing in the creation is sufficient to demonstrate a Providence to an humble and grateful mind.”

“Why, what is weeping and sighing? A judgement. What is misfortune? A judgement.”

“For God made all mankind to be happy, to be serene.”

“Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, and therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.”

“There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”

“Remember that all is opinion.”