Civilized life, if it is to be stable, must provide a harmless outlets for the impulses which our remote ancestors satisfied in hunting. In Australia, where people are few, and rabbits are many, I watched the whole populace satisfying the primitive impulse in the primitive manner by the skilful slaughter of many thousands of rabbits.

If we were all given by magic the power to read each other's thoughts, I suppose the first effect would be to dissolve all friendships.

It is only theory that makes men completely incautious.

One should as a rule respect public opinion in so far as is necessary to avoid starvation and to keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny.

Literature is inexhaustible, with every book a homage to infinity

A sense of duty is useful in work but offensive in personal relations. People wish to be liked, not to be endured with patient resignation.

Tobacco . . . is not prohibited in the Scriptures, though, as Samuel Butler points out, St. Paul would no doubt have denounced it if he had known of it.