The worst slave owners were those who were kind to their slaves.
A daughter is a mother’s gender partner, her closest ally in the family confederacy, an extension of herself. -Author Unknown As long as a woman can look ten years younger than her own daughter, she is perfectly satisfied.
The story of mankind began in a garden and ended in revelations.
The 19thc hatred of Realism is Caliban’s enraged reaction to seeing his own face in the mirror. The 19thc rejection of Romanticism is Caliban’s fury at not seeing his face reflected in the mirror.
If property had simply pleasures, we could stand it; but its duties make it unbearable. In the interest of the rich we must get rid of it.
Art is not to be taught in Academies. It is what one looks at, not what one listens to, that makes the artist. The real schools should be the streets.
Who is that man over there? I don’t know him. What is he doing? Is he a conspirator? Have you searched him? Give him till tomorrow to confess, then hang him! – hang him!
There are three kinds of despots. There is the despot who tyrannizes over the body. There is the despot who tyrannizes over the soul. There is the despot who tyrannizes over the soul and body alike. The first is called the Prince. The second is called the Pope. The third is called the People.
Despotism is unjust to everybody, including the despot, who was probably made for better things.
Dullness is the coming of age of seriousness.
The American father is never seen in London. He passes his life entirely in Wall Street and communicates with his family once a month by means of a telegram in cipher.
Like two doomed ships that pass in storm we had crossed each other’s way: but we made no sign, we said no word, we had no word to say.
I’m sure I don’t know half the people who come to my house. Indeed, from all I hear, I shouldn’t like to.
On the whole, the great success of marriage in the States is due partly to the fact that no American man is ever idle, and partly to the fact that no American wife is considered responsible for the quality of her husband’s dinners.
They flaunt their conjugal felicity in one’s face, as if it were the most fascinating of sins.
Newspapers have degenerated. They may now be absolutely relied upon.
For an artist to marry his model is as fatal as for a gourmet to marry his cook: the one gets no sittings, and the other gets no dinners.
If a man needs an elaborate tombstone in order to remain in the memory of his country, it is clear that his living at all was an act of absolute superfluity.
The sign of a Philistine age is the cry of immorality against art.
Only people who look dull ever get into the House of Commons, and only people who are dull ever succeed there.