The book⌗

This will serve to store notes/insights/thoughts about The Count of Monte Cristo

Quotes⌗

Page 34 - A curse on those who fear wine: it’s because they have evil thoughts and they are afraid that wine will loosen their tongues.

Page 54-55 - God can change the future, He can not alter even an instant of the past.

Page 90 - He looked up with the satisified air of a man who thinks he has made a discovery when he has commented on someone else’s idea.

Page 107- …in polotics there are no people, only ideas; no feelings, only interests.

Page 109 - You people who hold power have only what can be bought for money; we, who are waiting to gain power, have what is given out of devotion.

Page 121 - what can any prisoner have to ask for, apart from his freedom?

Page 132 - To a happy man, a prayer is a monotonous composition, void of meaning, until the day when suffering deciphers the sublime language through which the poor victim addresses God.

Page 154 - Because you have an instinctive horror at the idea of such a crime, to the point where it has never even entered your head, the old man continued. For, in simple and permitted matters, our natural appetites warn us not to exceed the boundaries of what is permissible for us. The tiger, which spills blood in the natural course of things, because this is its state of being, its destiny, needs only for its sense of smell to inform it that a prey is within reach; immediately it leaps towards this prey, falls on it and tears it apart. That is its instinct, which it obeys. But mankind, on the contrary, is repelled by blood. It is not the laws of society that condemn murder, but the laws of nature? Dantes was struck dumb: this was indeed the explanation of what had gone on, without him knowing it, in his mind - or, rather, in his soul: some thoughts come from the head, others from the heart.

Page 161 - unless an evil thought is born in a twisted mind, human nature is repelled by crime. However, civilization has given us needs, vices and artificial appetites which sometimes cause us to repress our good instincts and lead us to wrongdoing.' Hence the maxim: if you wish to find the guilty party, first discover whose interests the crime serves! Whose interests might be served by your disappearance?'

Page 168 - Learning does not make one learned: there are those who have knowledge and those who have understanding. The first requires memory, the second philosophy.

Page 339- In every country where independence takes the place of liberty, the first need felt by any strong mind and powerful constitution is to possess a weapon which can serve both for attack and defence; and which, by making its bearer formidable, will mean that he often inspires dread.

Page 502- more than once, proved to me that our excessive concern with the welfare of our bodies is almost the only obstacle to the success of any of our plans, when these demand rapid decisions and vigorous and determined execution. In reality, once you have made the sacrifice of your life, you are no longer the equal of other men; or, rather, they are no longer your equal, because whoever has taken such a resolution instantly feels his strength increase ten times and his outlook vastly extended.?

Page 552- What I am saying, Monsieur, is that your eyes are fixed on the social organization of nations, which means that you only see the mechanism and not the sublime worker who operates it. I am saying that you only recognize in front of you and around you those office-holders whose accreditation has been signed by a minister or by the king and that your short-sightedness leads you to ignore those men whom God has set above office-holders, ministers and kings, by giving them a mission to pursue instead of a position to fill.

Page 552- You know that all human inventions progress from the complex to the simple and that perfection is always simplicity.

Page 727- With one of those fatuous smiles which had the same effect on Monte Cristo as the pallid moons that inferior painters plant in the sky above their ruins.

Page 766- ‘His experiments have greatly advanced science, I presume?’ ‘No, but he writes them up in a very fine style.”

Page 850- When I close my eyes, I can again see everything that I used to see. There are two ways of seeing: with the body and with the soul. The body’s sight can sometimes forget, but the soul remembers for ever.

Page 872: Because, you must understand, my dear friend, one should never be exclusive. When one lives among madmen, one should train as a maniac.

Page 952: Moral wounds have the peculiarity that they are invisible, but do not close: always painful, always ready to bleed when touched, they remain tender and open in the heart.

Page 953: Truly generous men are always ready to feel compassion when their enemy’s misfortune exceeds the bounds of their hatred.

Notes⌗