The first recipe for happiness is: avoid too lengthy meditation on the past.

All of us, from time to time, need a plunge into freedom and novelty, after which routine and discipline will seem delightful by contrast.

To be witty is not enough. One must possess sufficient wit to avoid having too much of it.

The really great novel tends to be the exact negative of its author's life.

Self-pity comes so naturally to all of us. The most solid happiness can be shaken by the compassion of a fool.

Self-pity comes so naturally to all of us.

Either the soul is immortal and we shall not die, or it perishes with the flesh and we shall not know that we are dead. Live, then, as if you were eternal.