The cleverness of avarice is but the cunning of imbecility.

If you are in doubt whether to write a letter or not, don't. And the advice applies to many doubts in life besides that of letter writing.

Castles in the air cost a vast deal to keep up.

As a general rule, people who flagrantly pretend to anything are the reverse of that which they pretend to. A man who sets up for a saint is sure to be a sinner; and a man who boasts that he is a sinner is sure to have some feeble, maudlin, snivelling bit of saintship about him which is enough to make him a humbug.

There's no weapon that slays its victim so surely (if well aimed) as praise.

Bright and illustrious illusions!

That man will never be a perfect gentleman who lives only with gentlemen. To be a man of the world we must view that world in every grade and in every perspective.