Homer was wrong in saying, "Would that strife might pass away from among gods and men!" He did not see that he was praying for the destruction of the universe.

The novel is a perfect medium for revealing to us the changing rainbow of our living relationships. The novel can help us to live,as nothing else can: no didactic Scripture, anyhow. If the novelist keeps his thumb out of the pan.

Ours is an excessively conscious age. We know so much, we feel so little.

But then peace, peace! I am so mistrustful of it: so much afraid that it means a sort of weakness and giving in.

Creation destroys as it goes, throws down one tree for the rise of another. But ideal mankind would abolish death, multiply itself million upon million, rear up city upon city, save every parasite alive, until the accumulation of mere existence is swollen to a horror.

Brave people add up to an aristocracy. The democracy of thou-shalt-not is bound to be a collection of weak men.

I am convinced that the air we normally breathe is a kind of water, and men and women are a species of fish.