Quotes and anectdotes from the wise to the foolish, and the courageous to the drunk

Victor Hugo Statesman

  • Gender: Male
  • Citizenship: France
  • Born: Feb 26, 1802
  • Died: May 22, 1885

Victor Marie Hugo was a French poet, novelist, and dramatist of the Romantic movement. He is considered one of the greatest and best known French writers. In France, Hugo's literary fame comes first from his poetry but also rests upon his novels and his dramatic achievements. Among many volumes of poetry, Les Contemplations and La Légende des siècles stand particularly high in critical esteem. Outside France, his best-known works are the acclaimed novels Les Misérables, 1862, and Notre-Dame de Paris, 1831. He also produced more than 4,000 drawings, which have since been admired for their beauty, and earned widespread respect as a campaigner for social causes such as the abolition of the death penalty.

Though a committed royalist when he was young, Hugo's views changed as the decades passed, and he became a passionate supporter of republicanism; his work touches upon most of the political and social issues and artistic trends of his time. He was buried in the Panthéon. His legacy has been honored in many ways, including his portrait being placed on francs.

People do not lack strength they lack will. strength

Life's greatest happiness is to be convinced we are loved. happiness

Dear God! how beauty varies in nature and art. In a woman the flesh must be like marble in a statue the marble must be like flesh. art, beauty, God & nature

To give thanks in solitude is enough. Thanksgiving has wings and goes where it must go. Your prayer knows much more about it than you do. Thanksgiving

All the forces in the world are not so powerful as an idea whose time has come. power & time

The first symptom of love in a young man is timidity in a girl boldness. love

An invasion of armies can be resisted, but not an idea whose time has come. time

The supreme happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved loved for ourselves, or rather in spite of ourselves. happiness

Our life dreams the Utopia. Our death achieves the Ideal. death & dreams

There is one thing stronger than all the armies in the world, and that is an idea whose time as come. time

Fashions have done more harm than revolutions. funny

To think is of itself to be useful it is always and in all cases a striving toward God. God

Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent. music

Men like me are impossible until the day when they become necessary. men

Adversity makes men, and prosperity makes monsters. men

A compliment is something like a kiss through a veil. inspirational

Intelligence is the wife, imagination is the mistress, memory is the servant. imagination & intelligence

When grace is joined with wrinkles, it is adorable. There is an unspeakable dawn in happy old age. age

A war between Europeans is a civil war. war

Freedom in art, freedom in society, this is the double goal towards which all consistent and logical minds must strive. art, freedom & society

Nature has made a pebble and a female. The lapidary makes the diamond, and the lover makes the woman. nature

Conscience is God present in man. God

To love another person is to see the face of God. God & love

To love beauty is to see light. beauty & love

Doing nothing is happiness for children and misery for old men. happiness & men

Sorrow is a fruit. God does not make it grow on limbs too weak to bear it. God & sympathy

Certain thoughts are prayers. There are moments when, whatever be the attitude of the body, the soul is on its knees. attitude

Change your opinions, keep to your principles change your leaves, keep intact your roots. change

Scepticism, that dry caries of the intelligence. intelligence

Joy's smile is much closer to tears than laughter. smile

Many great actions are committed in small struggles. great

A library implies an act of faith. faith

We see past time in a telescope and present time in a microscope. Hence the apparent enormities of the present. time

Each man should frame life so that at some future hour fact and his dreaming meet. dreams & future

When God desires to destroy a thing, he entrusts its destruction to the thing itself. Every bad institution of this world ends by suicide. God

A great artist is a great man in a great child. great

The greatest happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves. happiness, life & love

Peace is the virtue of civilization. War is its crime. peace & war

Common sense is in spite of, not as the result of education. education

Smallness in a great man seems smaller by its disproportion with all the rest. great

There are fathers who do not love their children there is no grandfather who does not adore his grandson. love

The word is the Verb, and the Verb is God. God

He who opens a school door, closes a prison. education

I'm religiously opposed to religion. religion

What is history? An echo of the past in the future a reflex from the future on the past. future & history

A faith is a necessity to a man. Woe to him who believes in nothing. faith

To rise from error to truth is rare and beautiful. truth

The mountains, the forest, and the sea, render men savage they develop the fierce, but yet do not destroy the human. men

What would be ugly in a garden constitutes beauty in a mountain. beauty & nature

I love all men who think, even those who think otherwise than myself. men

Greater than the tread of mighty armies is an idea whose time has come. time

To be perfectly happy it does not suffice to possess happiness, it is necessary to have deserved it. happiness

Rhyme, that enslaved queen, that supreme charm of our poetry, that creator of our meter. poetry

Civil war? What does that mean? Is there any foreign war? Isn't every war fought between men, between brothers? men & war

A mother's arms are made of tenderness and children sleep soundly in them. Mother's Day

Love is a portion of the soul itself, and it is of the same nature as the celestial breathing of the atmosphere of paradise. love & nature

Short as life is, we make it still shorter by the careless waste of time. time

Because one doesn't like the way things are is no reason to be unjust towards God. God

Toleration is the best religion. best & religion

Well, for us, in history where goodness is a rare pearl, he who was good almost takes precedence over he who was great. good, great & history

Wisdom is a sacred communion. wisdom

As a means of contrast with the sublime, the grotesque is, in our view, the richest source that nature can offer. nature

Life is the flower for which love is the honey. life & love

Forty is the old age of youth fifty the youth of old age. age

Amnesty is as good for those who give it as for those who receive it. It has the admirable quality of bestowing mercy on both sides. good

Men become accustomed to poison by degrees. men

Hope is the word which God has written on the brow of every man. God & hope

Great perils have this beauty, that they bring to light the fraternity of strangers. beauty & great

There is nothing like a dream to create the future. future

Jesus wept Voltaire smiled. From that divine tear and from that human smile is derived the grace of present civilization. smile

Indigestion is charged by God with enforcing morality on the stomach. God

The ideal and the beautiful are identical the ideal corresponds to the idea, and beauty to form hence idea and substance are cognate. beauty

Nothing else in the world... not all the armies... is so powerful as an idea whose time has come. time