The main question to a novel is — did it amuse? were you surprised at dinner coming so soon? did you mistake eleven for ten? were you too late to dress? and did you sit...

With the death of what Sydney Smith described as rational religon and the proponents of what remains sending out such confusing and uncertain messages, all civilised people have to be ethicists. We must work out...

When you rise in the morning, form a resolution to make the day a happy one for a fellow creature.

Madam, I have been looking for a person who disliked gravy all my life; let us swear eternal friendship.

If I were to begin life again, I would devote it to music. It is the only cheap and unpunished rapture upon earth.

The fact is that in order to do anything in this world worth doing, we must not stand shivering on the bank thinking of the cold and the danger, but jump in and scramble through...

Regret for the things we did can be tempered by time; it is regret for the things we did not do that is inconsolable.

I always fear that creation will expire before teatime.

A man who wishes to make his way in life could do no better than go through the world with a boiling tea-kettle in his hand.