The diseases of the present have little in common with the diseases of the past save that we die of them.

The gospel of cheerfulness, I had almost said the gospel of amusement, is preached by people who lack experience to people who lack vitality. There is a vague impression that the world would be a good world if it were only happy, that it would be happy if it were amused, and that it would be amused if plenty of artificial recreation - that recreation for which we are now told every community stands responsible - were provided for its entertainment.

A world of vested interests is not a world which welcomes the disruptive force of candor.

the most comfortable characteristic of the period [1775-1825], and the one which incites our deepest envy, is the universal willingness to accept a good purpose as a substitute for good work.

if a man be discreet enough to take to hard drinking in his youth, before his general emptiness is ascertained, his friends invariably credit him with a host of shining qualities which, we are given to understand, lie balked and frustrated by his one unfortunate weakness.

It takes time and trouble to persuade ourselves that the things we want to do are the things we ought to do.

Wit is the salt of conversation, not the food, and few things in the world are more wearying than a sarcastic attitude towards life.