"There is, in lovers, a certain infatuation of egotism; they will have a witness of their happiness, cost that witness what it may."

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A country is strong which consists of wealthy families, every member of whom is interested in defending a common treasure; it is weak when composed of scattered individuals, to whom it matters little whether they obey seven or one, a Russian or a Corsican, so long as each keeps his own plot of land, blind in their wretched egotism, to the fact that the day is coming when this too will be torn from them.

— Honore de Balzac