Victor Hugo is one of the most renowned and influential French writers in history. His powerful and creative writing has stood the test of time, with many of his books—including Les Misérables and The Hunchback of Notre Dame – still widely read and beloved by millions around the world.
But perhaps even more impressive than his deep tales are the wise quotes that he left behind. Here we celebrate his immense influence by compiling 57 thought-provoking Victor Hugo quotes that encapsulate his wisdom – read on to draw inspiration from this literary genius!
I hope you enjoy these quotes by Victor Hugo…
1) “A few feet under the ground reigns so profound a silence, and yet so much tumult on the surface!”
2) “Our acts make or mar us, we are the children of our own deeds.”
3) “Adversity makes men, and prosperity makes monsters.”
4) “There is always more misery among the lower classes than there is humanity in the higher.”
5) “And you will keep me safe and you will keep me close and rain’ll make the flowers grow.”
6) “There are thoughts which are prayers. There are moments when, whatever the posture of the body, the soul is on its knees.”
7) “As the purse is emptied, the heart is filled.”
8) “At the end of life death is a departure; but at life’s beginning a departure is death.”
9) “Be as a bird perched on a frail branch that she feels bending beneath her, still she sings away all the same, knowing she has wings.”
Victor Hugo Quotes About Life
10) “Change your opinions, keep to your principles; change your leaves, keep intact your roots.”
11) “A creditor is worse than a slave-owner; for the master owns only your person, but a creditor owns your dignity, and can command it.”
12) “When dictatorship is a fact, revolution becomes a right.”
13) “Don’t educate your children to be rich. Educate them to be happy, so they know the value of things, not the price.”
14) “Even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise.”
15) “Forty is the old age of youth; fifty the youth of old age.”
16) “The future has several names. For the weak, it is impossible; for the fainthearted, it is unknown; but for the valiant, it is ideal.”
17) “The great acts of love are done by those who are habitually performing small acts of kindness.”
18) “The greatest happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved; loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves.”
19) “Have courage for the great sorrows of life and patience for the small ones; and when you have laboriously accomplished your daily task, go to sleep in peace. God is awake.”
Never stop learning…
20) “He never went out without a book under his arm, and he often came back with two.”
21) “The human soul has still greater need of the ideal than of the real. It is by the real that we exist, it is by the ideal that we love.”
22) “The ideal and the beautiful are identical; the ideal corresponds to the idea, and beauty to form; hence idea and substance are cognate.”
23) “Initiative is doing the right thing without being told.”
24) “Love is like a tree: it grows by itself, roots itself deeply in our being, and continues to flourish over a heart in ruin. The inexplicable fact is that the blinder it is, the more tenacious it is. It is never stronger than when it is completely unreasonable.”
25) “It is nothing to die. It is frightful not to live.”
26) “Laughter is the sun that drives winter from the human face.”
27) “Let us sacrifice one day to gain perhaps a whole life.”
28) “Life is the flower for which love is the honey.”
29) “To love another person is to see the face of God.”
Victor Hugo Quotes on Perseverance
30) “Many great actions are committed in small struggles.”
31) “He who is not master of his own thoughts is not accountable for his own deeds.”
32) “Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent.”
33) “Not being heard is no reason for silence.”
34) “There is nothing more powerful than an idea whose time has come.”
35) “There is one thing stronger than all the armies in the world, and that is an idea whose time has come.”
36) “To love or to have loved, that is enough. Ask nothing further there is no other pearl to be found in the dark folds of life.”
37) “Our mind is enriched by what we receive, our heart by what we give.”
38) “The rich’s paradise was created by the poor’s hell.”
39) “The power of a glance has been so much abused in love stories, that it has come to be disbelieved in. Few people dare now to say that two beings have fallen in love because they have looked at each other. Yet it is in this way that love begins, and in this way only.”
Victor Hugo Quotes About People
40) “People do not lack strength; they lack will.”
41) “Progress must believe in the face of God. The good cannot be served by impiety. An atheist is an evil leader of the human race.”
42) “To put everything in balance is good, to put everything in harmony is better.”
43) “I’d rather be hissed at for a good verse than applauded for a bad one.”
44) “Taste is the common sense of genius.”
45) “Teach the ignorant as much as you can; society is culpable in not providing a free education for all and it must answer for the night which it produces. If the soul is left in darkness, sins will be committed.”
46) “The greatest happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved; loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves.”
47) “There is something more terrible than a hell of suffering – a hell of boredom.”
48) “Those who live are those who fight.”
49) “To love beauty is to see light.”
Wise words…
50) “Well, for us, in history where goodness is a rare pearl, he who was good almost takes precedence over he who was great.”
51) “What Is Love? I have met in the streets a very poor young man who was in love. His hat was old, his coat worn, the water passed through his shoes and the stars through his soul.”
52) “When a woman is talking to you, listen to what she says with her eyes.”
53) “Where no plan is laid, where the disposal of time is surrendered merely to the chance of incidence, chaos will soon reign.”
54) “He who opens a school door, closes a prison.”
55) “The wicked envy and hate; it is their way of admiring.”
56) “Work, which makes a man free, and thought, which makes him worthy of freedom.”
57) “You who suffer because you love, love still more! To die of love is to live by it.”
Please share these quotes by Victor Hugo with your friends and family.
