We possess nothing certainly except the past

There is an Easter sense in which all things are made new in the risen Christ. A tiny gleam of this is reflected in all true art.

Most writers in the course of their careers become thick-skinned and learn to accept vituperation, which in any other profession would be unimaginably offensive, as a healthy counterpoise to unintelligent praise.

My father and I were never intimate in the sense of my coming to him with confidences or seeking advice. Our relationship was rather that of host and guest. Perhaps host and guest is really the happiest relation for father and son.

At first it was impressive, but after half and hour deadly monotonous. It was like everything German - overdone.

Every Englishman abroad, until it is proved to the contrary, likes to consider himself a traveller and not a tourist.

It is easy, retrospectively, to endow one's youth with a false precocity or a false innocence; to tamper with the dates marking one's stature on the edge of the door.