First love is only a little foolishness and a lot of curiosity.

The Great Man... is colder, harder, less hesitating, and without fear of 'opinion'; he lacks the virtues that accompany respect and 'respectability,' and altogether everything that is the 'virtue of the herd.' If he cannot lead, he goes alone... He knows he is incommunicable: he finds it tasteless to be familiar... When not speaking to himself, he wears a mask. There is a solitude within him that is inaccessible to praise or blame.

What can everyone do? Praise and blame. This is human virtue, this is human madness.

One can also be undignified and flattering toward a virtue.

Virtue gives happiness and a state of blessedness only to those who have a strong faith in their virtue: -not, however, to the more refined souls whose virtue consists of a profound distrust of themselves and of all virtue. After all, therefore, it is faith that saves here also!

Every virtue inclines to stupidity, every stupidity to virtue; "stupid to the point of sanctity," they say in Russia.