The very essence of romance is uncertainty.
Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something tragic.
Life is not complex. We are complex. Life is simple, and the simple thing is the right thing.
The fatal errors of life are not due to man’s being unreasonable: an unreasonable moment may be one’s finest moment. They are due to man’s being logical.
Friendship never forgets. That is the wonderful thing about it.
I write because it gives me the greatest possible artistic pleasure to write. If my work pleases the few I am gratified. As for the mob, I have no desire to be a popular novelist. It is far too easy.
The modern sympathy with invalids is morbid. Illness of any kind is hardly a thing to be encouraged in others.
To exercise power costs effort and demands courage. That is why so many fail to assert rights to which they are perfectly entitled – because a right is a kind of power but they are too lazy or too cowardly to exercise it. The virtues which cloak these faults are called patience and forbearance.
The British cook, for her iniquities, is a foolish woman who should be turned into a pillar of salt which she never knows how to use.
So lets knock a couple back and make some noise.
Fashion: by which what is really fantastic becomes for a moment the universal.
To be entirely free, and at the same time entirely dominated by law, is the eternal paradox of human life.
Whenever life sucks, remember you’re going to die someday.
Love is like a war; easy to start but hard to end and you never know where it might take you.
Genius is born-not paid.
At every single moment of one’s life one is what one is going to be no less than what one has been.
Our ambition should be to rule ourselves, the true kingdom for each one of us; and true progress is to know more, and be more, and to do more.
As long as war is regarded as wicked, it will always have its fascination. When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be popular.
No object is so beautiful that, under certain conditions, it will not look ugly.
To look wise is quite as good as understanding a thing, and very much easier.