Quotes by Giacomo Casanova

“There is no such thing as a perfectly happy or perfectly unhappy man in the world. One has more happiness in his life and another more unhappiness, and the same circumstance may produce widely diff...”

“It is always easy to break ones word to oneself.”

“The philosopher is a person who refuses no pleasures which do not produce greater sorrows, and who knows how to create new ones.”

“Hope is nothing but a deceitful flatterer accepted by reason only because it is often in need of palliatives.”

“lies, truth, loveI have always loved truth so passionately that I have often resorted to lying as a way of introducing it into the minds which were ignorant of it's charms.”

“If you have not done things worthy of being written about, at least write things worthy of being read.”

“Be the flame, not the moth.”

“To lead a blameless life you must curb your passions , and whatever misfortune may befall you cannot be ascribed by anyone to want of good luck, or attributed to fate; these words are devoid of sen...”

“There is no such thing as destiny. We ourselves shape our lives.”

“As for myself, I always willingly acknowledge my own self as the principal cause of every good and of every evil which may befall me; therefore, I have always found myself capable of being my own p...”

“Enjoy the present, bid defiance to the future, laugh at all those reasonable beings who exercise their reason to avoid the misfortunes which they fear, destroying at the same time the pleasure that...”

“We ourselve are the authors of almost all our woes and griefs, of which we so unreasonably complain.”

“From that moment our love became sad, and sadness is a disease which gives the death-blow to affection.”

“The man who seeks to educate himself must first read and then travel in order to correct what he has learned.”

“They [his readers, whom he asks to be his friends] will find that I have always loved truth so passionately that I have often resorted to lying as a way of first introducing it into minds which wer...”

“The source of love, as I learned later, is a curiosity which, combined with the inclination which nature is obliged to give us in order to preserve itself. [] Hence women make no mistake in taking ...”

“Desires are but pain and torment, and enjoyment is sweet because it delivers us from them.”

“I have never done anything in my life except try to make myself ill when I had my health and try to make myself well when I had lost it. I have been equally and thoroughly successful in both, and t...”

“What do you want to say to me?Nothingjust to talk about the profession I am entering. I am about to practice virtue in order to find a man who loves it only to destroy it' [replied Mademoiselle Ves...”

“The sweetest pleasures are those which are hardest to be won.”