As far back as I remember, long before I could write, I had played at making stories. But not until I was seven or more, did I begin to pray every night, "O God, let me write books! Please, God, let me write books!"

Nobody, not even the old, not even the despairing, wished to come to an end in time or in eternity.

One cannot lay a foundation by scattering stones, nor is a reputation for good work to be got by strewing volumes about the world.

To drink for pleasure may be a distraction, but to drink from misery is always a danger.

The only natural human beings seem to be those who are making trouble.

I never saw the man yet that came out of politics as clean as he went into 'em.

He felt with the force of a revelation that to throw up the clods of earth manfully is as beneficent as to revolutionize the world. It was not the matter of the work, but the mind that went into it, that counted - and the man who was not content to do small things well would leave great things undone.