How ungenerously in later life we disclaim the virtuous moods of our youth, living in retrospect long, summer days of unreflecting dissipation.

I read the newspapers with lively interest. It is seldom that they are absolutely, point-blank wrong. That is the popular belief, but those who are in the know can usually discern an embryo of truth, a little grit of fact, like the core of a pearl, round which have been deposited the delicate layers of ornament.

Of children as of procreation -- the pleasure momentary, the posture ridiculous, the expense damnable

Soon someone would say the fatal words, "Well, I think it’s time for me to go to bed.

There is something incomparably thrilling in first opening a brand new book.

... the understatement, the self-ridicule, the delight in the foreignness of foreigners, the complete denial of any attempt to enlist the sympathies of his readers in the hardships he has capriciously invited.

If it could only be like this always - always summer, always alone, the fruit always ripe and Aloysius in a good temper.