All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another.

You become a good writer just as you become a good joiner: by planing down your sentences.

Our passions are ourselves.

A people living under the perpetual menace of war and invasion is very easy to govern. It demands no social reform. It does not haggle over expenditures for armaments and military equipment. It pays without discussion, it ruins itself, and that is an excellent thing for the syndicates of financiers and manufacturers for whom patriotic terrors are an abundant source of gain.

It is better to understand little than to misunderstand a lot.

A person is never happy except at the price of some ignorance. [The ability to focus on positives and distract your mind from negatives for at least a time is a necessary skill for being happy.]

To die for an idea is to set a rather high price upon conjecture.