Surely one of the peculiar habits of circumstances is the way they follow, in their eternal recurrence, a single course. If an event happens once in a life, it may be depended upon to repeat later its general design.

... to be "literary" appeared to my deluded innocence as an unending romance.

No matter how vital experience might be while you lived it, no sooner was it ended and dead than it became as lifeless as the piles of dry dust in a school history book.

The truth is I've got the land on my back, an' it's drivin' me. Land is a hard driver.

Experience has taught me that the only cruelties people condemn are those with which they do not happen to be familiar.

Like all born politicians, their eye was for the main chance rather than for the argument, and they found it easier to forswear a conviction than to forego a comfort.

Give the young half a chance and they will create their own future, they will even create their own heaven and earth.