If men could regard the events of their own lives with more open minds, they would frequently discover that they did not really desire the things they failed to obtain.

Almost all great writers have as their motif, more or less disguised, the passage from childhood to maturity, the clash between the thrill of expectation and the disillusioning knowledge of truth. 'Lost Illusion' is the undisclosed title of every novel.

A great biography should, like the close of a great drama, leave behind it a feeling of serenity. We collect into a small bunch the flowers, the few flowers, which brought sweetness into a life, and present it as an offering to an accomplished destiny. It is the dying refrain of a completed song, the final verse of a finished poem.

We can talk frankly about our defects only to those who recognise our qualities.

Above all things, never be afraid. The enemy who forces you to retreat is himself afraid of you at that very moment.

I knew a man who had been virtually drowned and then revived. He said that his death had not been painful.

Style is the hallmark of a temperament stamped upon the material at hand.