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Victor Hugo

Victor Hugo Quotes

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Famous Victor Hugo Quotes

“Such is the remorseless progression of human society, shedding lives and souls as it goes on its way. It is an ocean into which men sink who have been cast out by the law and consigned, with help most cruelly withheld, to moral death. The sea is the pitiless social darkness into which the penal system casts those it has condemned, an unfathomable waste of misery. The human soul, lost in those depths, may become a corpse. Who shall revive it?”

MenWayHumansMayHas BeensSoulHelpingLawLostSocialMoralDarknessSeaGoes OnWasteOceanPrisonMiseryDepthCastsJailCorpsesHuman SoulProgressionHuman SocietyReviveUnfathomableRemorselessPrison System
Book:Les Misérables
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“We may remark in passing that to be blind and beloved may, in this world where nothing is perfect, be among the most strangely exquisite forms of happiness. The supreme happiness in life is the assurance of being loved; of being loved for oneself, even in spite of oneself; and this assurance the blind man possesses. In his affliction, to be served is to be caressed. Does he lack anything? no. Possessing love he is not deprived of light. A love, moreover, that is wholly pure. There can be no blindness where there is this certainty.”

MenWorldLifeMayDoeLightFormLife IsPerfectThis WorldPureBlindOneselfSupremePassingPassingsCertaintyBelovedSpiteAfflictionBlindnessAssuranceDeprivedRemarksExquisitePossessingLife HappinessBeing LovedBlind ManNothing Is Perfect
Author:Victor Hugo
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“Separated lovers cheat absence by a thousand fancies which have their own reality. They are prevented from seeing one another and they cannot write; nevertheless they find countless mysterious ways of corresponding, by sending each other the song of birds, the scent of flowers, the laughter of children.”

WayLoveWritingChildrenRealityLightDesireSongStarsSunSeeingCreationWindFlowerLoversThousandLaughterBirdAbsenceMysteriousFancyNeverthelessCheatScentGleamCorrespondingMysterious Ways
Author:Victor Hugo
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“In this world, which is so plainly the antechamber of another, there are no happy men. The true division of humanity is between those who live in light and those who live in darkness. Our aim must be to diminish the number of the latter and increase the number of the former. That is why we demand education and knowledge.”

MenWorldLightHumanityNumbersDarknessThis WorldDemandIncreaseAimFormerLatterDivisionDiminishHappy ManEducation And Knowledge
Book:Les Misérables
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“Nothing can be more depressing than to expose, naked to the light of thought, the hideous growth of argot. Indeed it is like a sort of repellent animal intended to dwell in darkness which has been dragged out of its cloaca. One seems to see a horned and living creature viciously struggling to be restored to the place where it belongs. One word is like a claw, another like a sightless and bleeding eye; and there are phrases which clutch like the pincers of a crab. And all of it is alive with the hideous vitality of things that have organized themselves amid disorganization.”

Has BeensLightSeemsEyeGrowthAnimalDarknessStruggleAliveCreaturesNakedPhrasesOrganizedDepressingVitalityOne WordBleedingHideousClawsLiving CreaturesClutchCrabsDisorganization
Book:Les Misérables
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“The book which the reader now holds in his hands, from one end to the other, as a whole and in its details, whatever gaps, exceptions, or weaknesses it may contain, treats of the advance from evil to good, from injustice to justice, from falsity to truth, from darkness to daylight, from blind appetite to conscience, from decay to life, from bestiality to duty, from Hell to Heaven, from limbo to God. Matter itself is the starting-point, and the point of arrival is the soul. Hydra at the beginning, an angel at the end.”

MayBookSoulEndsMatterWholeHandsEvilHeavenJusticeDarknessHellDutyReaderWeaknessConscienceAngelTreatsBlindInjusticeStartingDetailsExceptionGapsAppetiteDecayDaylightArrivalsStarting PointLimboFalsityHydra
Author:Victor Hugo
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“Superstition, bigotry and prejudice, ghosts though they are, cling tenaciously to life; they are shades armed with tooth and claw. They must be grappled with unceasingly, for it is a fateful part of human destiny that it is condemned to wage perpetual war against ghosts. A shade is not easily taken by the throat and destroyed.”

HumansWarPoliticalDestinyTakenAtheismPrejudiceGhostTeethDestroyedBigotryThroatShadeSuperstitionsPerpetualClawsPerpetual War
Author:Victor Hugo
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“Whether we be Italians or Frenchmen, misery concerns us all. Ever since history has been written, ever since philosophy has meditated, misery has been the garment of the human race; the moment has at length arrived for tearing off that rag, and for replacing, upon the naked limbs of the Man-People, the sinister fragment of the past with the grand purple robe of the dawn.”

PeopleMenHumansHas BeensPhilosophyMomentsPastRaceWrittenConcernMiseryNakedDawnHuman RaceLengthLimbsFragmentsPurpleGarmentsRobesRagsSinisterFrenchmen
Book:Works: Les misérables; Fantine. Cosette. Marius. Saint-Denis. Jean Valjean
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“Whenever we encounter the Infinite in man, however imperfectly understood, we treat it with respect. Whether in the synagogue, the mosque, the pagoda, or the wigwam, there is a hideous aspect which we execrate and a sublime aspect which we venerate. So great a subject for spiritual contemplation, such measureless dreaming - the echo of God on the human wall!”

MenHumansDreamSpiritualSubjectsWallUnderstoodAspectTreatsInfiniteContemplationEncountersInfinityEchoesSublimeHideousMosquesSynagogue
Book:Les Misérables
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