I think I like 'em better like that...divinely dull...just the quiet bearers of their own beauty, like the priestesses in a Panathenaic procession.

There is someone I must say goodbye to. Oh, not you - we are sure to see each other again - but the Lily Bart you knew. I have kept her with me all this time, but now we are going to part, and I have brought her back to you - I am going to leave her here. When I go out presently she will not go with me. I shall like to think that she has stayed with you.

Nothing is more perplexing to a man than the mental process of a woman who reasons her emotions.

True originality consists not in a new manner but in a new vision.

One of the surprises of her unoccupied state was the discovery that time, when it is left to itself and no definite demands are made on it, cannot be trusted to move at any recognized pace

The real alchemy consists in being able to turn gold back again into something else; and that's the secret that most of your friends have lost.

I had the story, bit by bit, from various people, and, as generally happens in such cases, each time it was a different story.