I was a modest, good-humored boy. It is Oxford that has made me insufferable.
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No fine work can be done without concentration and self-sacrifice and toil and doubt.
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How many charming talents have been spoiled by the instilled desire to do 'important' work! Some people are born to lift heavy weights. Some are born to juggle with golden balls.
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He is an old bore. Even the grave yawns for him.
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It seems to be a law of nature that no man, unless he has some obvious physical deformity, ever is loth to sit for his portrait.
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It distresses me, this failure to keep pace with the leaders of thought, as they pass into oblivion.
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I was born old and get younger every day. At present I am sixty years young.
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You cannot make a man by standing a sheep on its hind legs. But by standing a flock of sheep in that position you can make a crowd of men.
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The Non-Conformist Conscience makes cowards of us all.
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To say that a man is vain means merely that he is pleased with the effect he produces on other people. A conceited man is satisfied with the effect he produces on himself.
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Cynicism is the humor of hatred.
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The dullard's envy of brilliant men is always assuaged by the suspicion that they will come to a bad end.
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Never say a humorous thing to a man who does not possess humour. He will always use it in evidence against you.
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Good sense about trivialities is better than nonsense about things that matter.
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Mankind is divisible into two great classes: hosts and guests.
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To give an accurate and exhaustive account of that period would need a far less brilliant pen than mine.
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People who insist on telling their dreams are among the terrors of the breakfast table.
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Only mediocrity can be trusted to be always at its best.
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People are too apt to treat God as if he were a minor royalty.
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Nobody ever died of laughter.
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There is much to be said for failure. It is much more interesting than success.
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