Every author, however modest, keeps a most outrageous vanity chained like a madman in the padded cell of his breast.

The denunciation of the young is a necessary part of the hygiene of older people, and greatly assists the circulation of the blood.

The vitality of a new movement in Art must be gauged by the fury it arouses.

There are two things to aim at in life: first, to get what you want, and after that to enjoy it. Only the wisest of mankind achieve the second.

A man cannot be said to succeed in this life who does not satisfy one friend.

There are few sorrows, however poignant, in which a good income is of no avail.

What is more mortifying than to feel that you have missed the plum for want of courage to shake the tree?

Thank Heaven, the sun has gone in, and I don’t have to go out and enjoy it.

There are people who, like houses, are beautiful in dilapidation.

Only a generation of readers will span a generation of writers.

Most people sell their souls, and live with a good conscience on the proceeds.

The test of a vocation is the love of the drudgery it involves.

Solvency is entirely a matter of temperament and not of income.

If you want to be thought a liar, always tell the truth.

People say that life is the thing, but I prefer reading.

What joy can the years bring half so sweet as the unhappiness they’ve taken away?

Charming people live up to the very edge of their charm, and behave as outrageously as the world lets them.

To suppose as we all suppose, that we could be rich and not behave as the rich behave, is like supposing that we could drink all day and stay sober.

A slight touch of friendly malice and amusement towards those we love keeps our affections for them from turning flat.

Every author, however modest, keeps a most outrageous vanity chained like a madman in the padded cell of his breast.

It takes a great man to give sound advice tactfully, but a greater to accept it graciously.

People before the public live an imagined life in the thought of others, and flourish or feel faint as their self outside themselves grows bright or dwindles in that mirror.

When they come downstairs from their Ivory Towers, idealists are very apt to walk straight into the gutter.

If you are losing your leisure, look out; you may be losing your soul.

Our names are labels, plainly printed on the bottled essence of our past behavior.

The old know what they want; the young are sad and bewildered.

It is through the cracks in our brains that ecstasy creeps in.

How can they say my life is not a success? Have I not for more than sixty years got enough to eat and escaped being eaten?

What’s more enchanting than the voices of young people, when you can’t hear what they say?

Don’t laugh at a youth for his affectations; he is only trying on one face after another to find a face of his own.

It is the wretchedness of being rich that you have to live with rich people.

Happiness is a wine of the rarest vintage, and seems insipid to a vulgar taste.

We need two kinds of acquaintances, one to complain to, while to the others we boast.

Those who set out to serve both God and Mammon soon discover that there is no God.

A best-seller is the gilded tomb of a mediocre talent.

All my life, as down an abyss without a bottom. I have been pouring van loads of information into that vacancy of oblivion I call my mind.

There is more felicity on the far side of baldness than young men can possibly imagine.

What I like in a good author is not what he says but what he whispers.

The newest books are those that never grow old.