The education that we have so far succeeded in giving to the bulk of our citizens has produced a generation of mental slatterns.

The only ethical principle which has made science possible is that the truth shall be told all the time. If we do not penalize false statements made in error, we open up the way for false statements by intention. And a false statement of fact, made deliberately, is the most serious crime a scientist can commit.

Do you know how to pick a lock?" "Not in the least, I'm afraid." "I often wonder what we go to school for," said Wimsey.

[N]othing about a book is so unmistakable and so irreplaceable as the stamp of the cultured mind. I don't care what the story is about or what may be the momentary craze for books that appear to have been hammered out by the village blacksmith in a state of intoxication; the minute you get the easy touch of the real craftsman with centuries of civilisation behind him, you get literature.

There's ways and ways of dyin'. Some is took, and some takes French leave, and others is 'elped out of life.

The great advantage about telling the truth is that nobody ever believes it.

To make a deliberate falsification for personal gain is the last, worst depth to which either scholar or artist can descend in work or life.