I waited and worked, and watched the inferior exalted for nearly thirty years; and when recognition came at last, it was too late to alter events, or to make a difference in living.

marriage is mostly puttin' up with things, I reckon, when it ain't makin' believe.

But youth isn't happy. Youth is sadder than age.

I have watchedmany literary fashions shoot up and blossom, and then fade and drop.... Yet with the many that I have seen comeand go, I have never yet encountered a mode of thinking that regarded itself as simply a changing fashion, and not as an infallible approach to the right culture.

First, I was an idealist (that was early - fools are born, not made, you know); next I was a realist; now I am a pessimist, and, by Jove! if things get much worse I'll become a humorist.

What fools people are when they think they can make two lives belong together by saying words over them.

To mourn was distressing, but to endeavor to mourn and fail was worse than distress.