If you are to judge a man, you must know his secret thoughts, sorrows, and feelings; to know merely the outward events of a man’s life would only serve to make a chronological table — a fool’s notion of history!

[Pour juger un homme, au moins faut-il être dans le secret de sa pensée, de ses malheurs, de ses émotions; ne vouloir connaître de sa vie que les événements matériels, c’est faire de la chronologie, l’histoire des sots!]

Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) French novelist, playwright
The Wild Ass’s Skin [La Peau de chagrin], Part 2 “A Woman without a Heart” (1831) [tr. Marriage]

 
Added on 5-Oct-10 | Last updated 5-Oct-10
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