I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter.

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  All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.

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  The heart has its reasons, which reason does not know.

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  It would be better for you, young man, not to write. Writing is what brought you to jail. Had you been illiterate, you might today be a decent, honest man and perhaps a respected citizen, but as it is you drag yourself from jail to jail like a gambler.

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  First you torment yourself until you write it, then you torment the editor to print it… then the public prosecutor to charge you and, finally, the judge to sentence you.

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  Medicine is my lawful wife and literature is my mistress.

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  A successful man is simply one who doesn’t make a fool of himself in the same way more than two or three times running.

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