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Victor Hugo Quotes
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308 Quotes to Uplift Your Spirit and Guide You with Timeless Wisdom

Explore Victor Hugo's profound insights and timeless wisdom. Be inspired by powerful quotes on belief, love, and more. Let the words of this literary icon uplift your spirit and guide you.

Victor-Marie Hugo was a highly acclaimed French Romantic writer and politician, hailed as one of the greatest French writers of all time. With a literary career spanning over six decades, he excelled in various genres and forms of writing. His notable works include the novels "The Hunchback of Notre-Dame" and "Les Misérables," as well as poetry collections like "Les Contemplations" and "La Légende des siècles." Furthermore, his influence extended beyond literature, inspiring musical adaptations such as the opera Rigoletto and the musicals Les Misérables and Notre-Dame de Paris. Additionally, Hugo championed social causes like the elimination of capital punishment and showcased his artistic talents through over 4,000 drawings.

Initially a staunch royalist, Hugo's perspectives underwent a significant transformation as he grew older. He developed an unwavering support for republicanism and actively engaged in political activities, serving both as a deputy and a senator. Throughout his work, he fearlessly addressed pressing political and social issues while embodying the artistic trends prevalent during his era. His resolute stance against absolute power coupled with his literary achievements earned him recognition as a national hero.

Victor Hugo passed away on May 22, 1885 at the age of 83. His legacy was honored with an elaborate state funeral held at the Panthéon in Paris, which drew an astounding attendance of over two million people—the largest gathering in French history.

✵ 26. February 1802 – 22. May 1885  •  Other names Victor Marie Hugo, Виктор Гюго
Victor Hugo photo
Victor Hugo: 308 quotes51 likes

Victor Hugo Quotes

“What a great thing, to be loved! What a greater thing still, to love! The heart becomes heroic though passion…if no one loved, the sun would go out.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“The saints were his friends, and blessed him; the monsters were his friends, and guarded him.”

Victor Hugo book The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Source: The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

“To love beauty is to see light.”

Victor Hugo

“I think, therefore I doubt.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“In joined hands there is still some token of hope, in the clinched fist none.”

Victor Hugo

Source: The Toilers of the Sea

“He who every morning plans the transactions of that day and follows that plan carries a thread that will guide him through the labyrinth of the most busy life.”

Victor Hugo

“It is not enough to be happy, one must be content.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Miserables

“So long as ignorance and poverty exist on earth, books of the nature of Les Miserables cannot fail to be of use.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“There are accepted revolutions, revolutions which are called revolutions; there are refused revolutions, which are called riots.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“Monsieur' to a convict is a glass of water to a man dying of thirst at sea; ignominy thirsts for respect.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“Ah," cried Gavroche, "what does this mean? It rains again!… If this continues, I withdraw my subscription.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“… It all seemed to him to have disappeared as if behind a curtain at a theater. There are such curtains that drop in life. God is moving on to the next act.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“Yes, the brutalities of progress are called revolutions”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“The supreme happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Variant: Life's great happiness is to be convinced we are loved.
Source: Les Misérables

“There is no vacuum in the human heart. Certain demolitions take place, and it is well that they do, but on condition that they are followed by reconstructions.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“Jean Prouvaire was timid only in repose. Once excited, he burst forth, a sort of mirth accentuated his enthusiasm, and he was at once both laughing and lyric.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“Love is a fault; so be it.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“His judgement demonstrates that one can be a genius and understand nothing of an art that is not one's own.”

Victor Hugo book The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Source: The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

“To a gargoyle on the ramparts of Notre Dame as Esmeralda rides off with Gringoire Quasimodo says. "Why was I not made of stone like thee?”

Victor Hugo book The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Source: The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

“The delight we inspire in others has this enchanting peculiarity that, far from being diminished like every other reflection, it returns to us more radiant than ever.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“People weighed down with troubles do not look back; they know only too well that misfortune stalks them.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“The mother… swinging the children by pulling on a length of string, while at the same time she kept and eye on them with that protective watchfulness, half animal, half angelic, which is the quality of motherhood.”

Victor Hugo

“You look at a star for two reasons, because it is luminous, and because it is impenetrable. You have beside you a sweeter radiance and a greater mystery, woman.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Miserables

“Of all the things that God has made, the human heart is the one which sheds the most light, alas! and the most darkness.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Miserables

“Let us fear ourselves. Prejudices are the real robbers; vices are the real murderers. The great dangers lie within ourselves.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“The women laughed and wept; the crowd stamped their feet enthusiastically, for at that moment Quasimodo was really beautiful. He was handsome — this orphan, this foundling, this outcast.”

Victor Hugo

Source: The Hunchback Of Notre Dame

“If he had had all Peru in his pocket, he would certainly have given it to this dancer; but Gringoire had not Peru in his pocket; and besides, America was not yet discovered. (p. 66)”

Victor Hugo book The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Source: The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

“The infinite exists. It is there. If the infinite had nothewould be its limit; it would not be the infinite; in other words, it would not be. But it is. Then it has aThisof the infinite is God.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“At the moment when her eyes closed, when all feeling vanished in her, she thought that she felt a touch of fire imprinted on her lips, a kiss more burning than the red-hot iron of the executioner.”

Victor Hugo book The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Source: The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

“There are people who observe the rules of honor as one observes the stars, from a great distance.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Miserables

“Man is not a circle with a single center; he is an ellipse with two focii. Facts are one, ideas are the other.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“France is great because she is France.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“Sometimes he used a spade in his garden, and sometimes he read and wrote. He had but one name for these two kinds of labor; he called them gardening. ‘The Spirit is a garden,’ said he”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“Die, very good, but do not make others die. Suicides like the one which is about to take place here are sublime, but suicide is restricted, and does not allow of extension; and so soon as it affects your neighbors, suicide becomes murder.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“Freedom in art, freedom in society, this is the double goal towards which all consistent and logical minds must strive.”

Victor Hugo

“where the telescope ends the microscope begins, and who can say which has the wider vision?”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“Table talk and Lovers' talk equally elude the grasp; Lovers' Talk is clouds, Table Talk is smoke."

Les Miserables”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“Large, heavy, ragged black clouds hung like crape hammocks beneath the starry cope of the night. You would have said that they were the cobwebs of the firmament.”

Victor Hugo book The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Source: The Hunchback of Notre Dame

“The greatest products of architecture are less the works of individuals than of society; rather the offspring of a nation's effort, than the inspired flash of a man of genius…”

Victor Hugo book The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Source: The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

“True or false, that which is said of men often occupies as important a place in their lives, and above all in their destinies, as that which they do.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Variant: What is said about men often has as much influence upon their lives, and especially upon their destinies, as what they do.
Source: Les Misérables

“A breath of Paris preserves the soul.”

Victor Hugo

“But alas, if I have not maintained my victory, it is God's fault for not making man and the devil of equal strength.”

Victor Hugo book The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Source: The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

“Sire, you are looking at a plain man, and I am looking at a great man. Each of us may benefit.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

“She worked in order to live, and presently fell in love, also in order to live, for the heart, too, has its hunger.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables