Madame de Stael
Madame de Stael
Anne Louise Germaine de Staël-Holstein, commonly known as Madame de Staël, was a French woman of letters of Swiss origin whose lifetime overlapped with the events of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic era. She was one of Napoleon's principal opponents. Celebrated for her conversational eloquence, she participated actively in the political and intellectual life of her times. Her works, both critical and fictional, made their mark on the history of European Romanticism...
NationalityFrench
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth22 April 1766
CountryFrance
Madame de Stael quotes about
Genius is essentially creative; it bears the stamp of the individual who possesses it.
Kindness and generosity ... form the true morality of human actions.
Love is the symbol of eternity.
Enthusiasm gives life to what is invisible; and interest to what has no immediate action on our comfort in this world.
One must choose in life between boredom and suffering.
When we destroy an old prejudice, we have need of a new virtue.
a perfect piece of architecture kindles that aimless reverie, which bears the soul we know not whither.
[On Italian:] One may almost call it a language that talks of itself, and always seems more witty than its speakers.
Self-love, so sensitive in its own cause, has rarely any sympathy to spare for others.
in Italy, almost at every step, history and poetry add to the graces of nature, sweeten the memory of the past, and seem to preserve it in eternal youth.
Venice astonishes more than it pleases at first sight ...
There are women vain of advantages not connected with their persons, such as birth, rank, and fortune; it is difficult to feel less the dignity of the sex. The origin of all women may be called celestial, for their power is the offspring of the gifts of Nature; by yielding to pride and ambition they soon destroy the magic of their charms.
New doctrines ever displease the old. They like to fancy that the world has been losing wisdom, instead of gaining it, since they were young.
nothing is so horrifying as the possibility of existing simply because we do not know how to die.