It's a very cheery thing to come into London by any of these lines which run high and allow you to look down upon the houses like this." I thought he was joking, for the view was sordid enough, but he soon explained himself. "Look at those big, isolated clumps of buildings rising up above the slates, like brick islands in a lead-coloured sea." "The board-schools." "Light-houses, my boy! Beacons of the future! Capsules with hundreds of bright little seeds in each, out of which will spring the wiser, better England of the future.

Do you know anything on earth which has not a dangerous side if it is mishandled and exaggerated?

The love of books is among the choicest gifts of the gods.

Draw your chair up, and hand me my violin, for the only problem which we have still to solve is how to while away these bleak autumnal evenings.

I suppose I shall have to compound a felony as usual.

Everything comes in circles. [...] The old wheel turns, and the same spoke comes up. It's all been done before, and will be again.

So complex is the human spirit that it can itself scarce discern the deep springs which impel it to action.