104
" Oh! Schopenhauer alone had done the right thing! He did not intend to cure anything, offered the sick person no compensation, no hope; but his theory of pessimism was basically the great comforter of the chosen spirits, of all sublime souls. It revealed society as it is, it emphasized the innate stupidity of women, showed the beaten paths, saved people from disappointment, urged them to limit their hopes as much as possible, and if the strength is enough not to cherish any ...
These considerations relieved the duke of a heavy burden. This great German banished his shudder of thoughts and, through the points of contact between his two doctrines, brought him to the point where he could not forget this poetic and touching Catholicism in which he was raised and of which he had soaked in the essence in all pores in his youth. "
― Joris-Karl Huysmans , Against Nature (À Rebours)
106
" Elle devenait en quelque sorte, la déité symbolique de l'indestructible Luxure, la déesse de l'immortelle Hystérie, la beauté maudite, élue entre toutes par la catalepsie qui lui raidit les chairs et lui durcit les muscles; la Bête monstrueuse, indifférente, irresponsable, insensible, empoisonnant, de même que l’Hélène antique, tout ce qui l'approche, tout ce qui la voit, tout ce qu'elle touche. "
― Joris-Karl Huysmans , Against Nature (À Rebours)
108
" Ainsi comprise, elle appartenait aux théogonies de l''Extrême-Orient; elle ne relevait plus des traditions bibliques, ne pouvait même plus être assimilé à la vivante image de Babylone, à la royale Prostituée de l'Apocalypse, accoutrée, comme elle, de joyaux et de pourpre, fardée comme elle ; car celle-là n’était pas jetée par une puissance fatidique, par une force suprême, dans les attirantes abjections de la débauche. "
― Joris-Karl Huysmans , Against Nature (À Rebours)
111
" Feet frozen, squeezed inside boots stiffened by showers and puddles, skull white hot from the gas burner hissing above his head, M. Folantin had barely eaten anything and even now bad luck wouldn't let him be; his fire was faltering, his lamp was smoking, his tobacco was damp and kept going out, staining the cigarette paper with yellow nicotine.
A great depression gripped him; the emptiness of his narrow life became apparent, and as he stirred the coals with his poker, M. Folantin, leaning forward in his armchair, his forehead resting on the mantelpiece, began to review his forty-year Way of the Cross, stopping in despair at each Station. "
― Joris-Karl Huysmans , Downstream
112
" The bourgeoisie, reassured, strutted about in good humor, thanks to its wealth and the contagion of its stupidity. The result of its accession to power had been the destruction of all intelligence, the negation of all honesty, the death of all art, and, in fact, the debased artists had fallen on their knees, and they eagerly kissed the dirty feet of the eminent jobbers and low satraps whose alms permitted them to live. "
― Joris-Karl Huysmans , Against Nature (À Rebours)
114
" An aunt, who though not a midwife was expert in that kind of work, helped bring forth the child, cleaning his face with butter and, to save money, powdering his thighs with some flour scraped from a crust of bread in lieu of talcum. "So you see, my boy, you come from humble stock," his Aunt Eudore would say, acquainting him of these petty details, and from an early age Jean didn't dare hope for any kind of good fortune in the future. "
― Joris-Karl Huysmans , Downstream