life is short and information endless: nobody has time for everything

A bad book is as much of a labor to write as a good one, it comes as sincerely from the author's soul.

Actual happiness always looks pretty squalid in comparison with the over-compensations for misery.

Dying is almost the least spiritual of our acts, more strictly carnal even than the act of love. There are Death Agonies that are like the strainings of the Costive at stool.

The surest way to work up a crusade in favor of some good cause is to promise people they will have a chance of maltreating someone. To be able to destroy with good conscience, to be able to behave badly and call your bad behavior 'righteous indignation' — this is the height of psychological luxury, the most delicious of moral treats.

But the nature of the universe is such that ends can never justify means. On the contrary, the means always determine the end.

Folly is often more cruel in the consequences than malice can be in the intent.