Oh! that gentleness! how far more potent is it than force!

The writer who possesses the creative gift owns something of which he is not always master - something that, at times, strangely wills and works for itself.

There is nothing I fear so much as idleness, the want of occupation, inactivity, the lethargy of the faculties; when the body is idle, the spirit suffers painfully.

Give him enough rope and he will hang himself.

Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour ... If at my convenience I might break them, what would be their worth?

You are human and fallible.

He was the first to recognise me, and to love what he saw.