FOLLOW A WORD THROUGH THE COLLECTION
Search the corpus.
Phrase search ignores case and repeated whitespace. All-words search finds whole words anywhere on the same page. OCR errors can affect results.
14 matching pages
Page 1 of 11928 · PDF PAGE 30
…of Paradise! You impudent fellow; you dare to walk about in the poor quarters of the town, and you have not even glasses which make life look beautiful! And I pushed him vigorously towards the staircase, where he stumbled and swore. I went to the balcony and seized a little flower-pot; and when the man reappeared in the doorway I let fall my engine of war on the back edge of his shoulder straps, and the shock overthrowing him, he broke beneath his back all his poor walking stock-in-trade, which uttered the crashing cry of a glass palace split …
1928 · PDF PAGE 118
…no longer listening to his talk, but with a startling fixity had fastened his gaze upon I knew not what point of heaven, said suddenly, Look, look there; do you see Him? He is sitting on that little lonely cloud, that lit- tle fire-coloured cloud that moves so softly, and He tooone would say that He was look- ing at us. But who then? asked the others. God, he replied, with an accent of perfect conviction. Ah, He is already very far awayin a moment you will not be able to see Him any more; I think He must be travelling, to visit every c…
1928 · PDF PAGE 142
XL THE MIRROR A SHOCKINGLY ugly man comes in and looks at himself in the glass. Why do you look at yourself in the mirror, since you cannot see yourself there but with displeasure? Sir Ugly answers me, Sir, ac- cording to the immortal principles of the year 89, all men have equal rights; ergo, I possess the right of looking at myself,whether with pleasure or chagrin is no ones business but my own. In the name of good sense, I was doubtless right; but from a legal standpoint he was cer- tainly not wrong.
1928 · PDF PAGE 13
… does not prevent them from being intense, and no point is sharper than that of the Infinite. How great is the delight of drowning ones look in the vastness of sky and sea; solitude, silence, incomparable chastity of the blue; one little sail shuddering on the horizon is like a re- flection of my irremediable existence; the me- lodious monotony of the swell; all these things think by virtue of me, or I think by virtue of them (for in the vastness of the reverie the Ego is soon lost)they think, I say, but musi- cally and picturesquely, without…
1928 · PDF PAGE 22
…cupola of heaven, their feet plunged in the dust of a ground as desolate as that heaven itself. They went on their way with the resigned look of those who are damned to hope eternally. And the caravan passed beside me and hid itself in the atmosphere of the horizon, at that point where the rounded surface of the planet withdraws itself from the curiosity of man. For some moments I obstinately strove to understand the mystery; but soon irresistible indifference settled upon me, and I was more heavily weighed down by it than they them- selves wer…
1928 · PDF PAGE 117
…ir sashes; oh, but it is beautiful! The la- dies are much lovelier and taller than the ones that come to see us at home, and though they look terrible with their big hollow eyes and flaming cheeks, you cannot help loving them; you are afraid, you want to cry, and yet all the time you are happy. . . . And then, funnier
1928 · PDF PAGE 18
…here? What magic power has in- stalled he on this throne of reverie and of pleasure? What does it matter?There She is; I recognize Her. Look! See those eyes whose flame shoots across the twilight; those subtle and terrible Mirrors-of-Venus that I recognize by their terri- fying malice. They attract, they subjugate, they devour the glance of the rash man who contemplates them. I have studied them often, those black stars which compel curiosity and admiration. To what benevolent demon do I owe it that I am thus surrounded with mystery, with si- …
1928 · PDF PAGE 82
… as I like. You never feel then, says he to me, with a slightly apostolic snivel, the need of sharing your en- joyments with others? Look what a subtle form of envy is his; he knows that I disdain his pleasures, and he wishes to sneak into mine, the ugly spoilsport! This great misfortune of not being able to be alone, says somewhere La Bruyère, as if to shame those who run to forget themselves in the crowd, fearing doubtless that they will be unable to tolerate their own company. Nearly all our misfortunes come to us from our not havin…
1928 · PDF PAGE 177
…oor and full of bugs; two straw chairs, a cast-iron stove, one or two damaged instru- ments of music. Oh, what depressing furniture! But look, I beg you, at these two intelligent personages, clothed in robes at once sumptu- ous and frayed, their hair dressed like trouba- dours or soldiers, who inspect with a wizard- keen attention the nameless dish which sim- mers on the lighted stove, in the centre of which a long spoon stands up planted like one of those aerial masts which announce that the masonry of a building is complete! Is it not that su…
1928 · PDF PAGE 84
…night, to accompany my dreams, the plaintive song of musical trees, the melancholy filaos; yes, indeed, there is the surrounding which I looked for; what do I want with a palace? And further, going down a broad avenue, he saw a tidy little inn, where, from a window made cheerful by curtains of many-coloured calico, two laughing heads leaned out. At once he said to himself, My thought must indeed be a vagabond to go so far to look for what is so near me. Pleasure and happiness live in the first inn one comes to; in the chance inn; is not chanc…
1928 · PDF PAGE 147
…And everyone admired her as much as I did. When we went into a restaurant, at the end of some minutes everyone forgot to eat in order to look at her. The waiters themselves, and the lady at the cash-desk, felt the contagious ec- stasy so strangely that they would forget their duties. In short, I lived for some time alone with a living phenomenon. She ate, chewed,
1928 · PDF PAGE 164
…s; I do not know, I do not remember. What bizarre things does not one find in a great city when one knows how to walk about and how to look! Life swarms with innocent monsters. Oh Lord my God, Thou Creator, Thou Master, Thou who hast made law and lib-
1928 · PDF PAGE 171
…e carcass turn over, spring up with such an energy which I should never have suspected from so seriously dam- aged a machine, and with a look of hatred which appeared to me of the best augury, the decrepit brigand threw himself upon me, gave me two black eyes, broke four of my teeth, and with the same branch beat me to the con-
1928 · PDF PAGE 111
My profession of painter impels me to look attentively at every face which I see in the course of the day, and you know well what en- joyment we draw from this faculty which ren- ders life more living and significant to our eyes than it is for other men. In the retired district where I dwelt, and where broad brass-covered spaces still separate the buildings, I often saw a child whose eager and merry face attracted me at the first glance more than did that of anyone else. He had posed more than once for me, and I have turned him at one time into…