Books give not wisdom where none was before. But where some is, there reading makes it more.

Art is a profession, not a shrine.

The greatest gift is a passion for reading.

In the long run wives are to be paid in a peculiar coin — consideration for their feelings. As it usually turns out this is an enormous, unthinkable inflation few men will remit, or if they will, only with a sense of being overcharged.

Mothers born on relief have their babies on relief. Nothingness, truly, seems to be the condition of these New York people. They are nomads going from one rooming house to another, looking for a toilet that functions.

Sometimes one has the feeling of an almost supernatural character to the shifts and changes in our national mood. They appear beyond the prose of cause and effect.

Making a living is nothing; the great difficulty is making a point, making a difference-with words.