The ability to hold two competing thoughts in one's mind and still be able to function is the mark of a superior mind

all the time something within her was crying for a decision. She wanted her life shaped now, immediately — and the decision must be made by some force — of love, of money, of unquestionable practicality — that was close at hand

When people are taken out of their depths they lose their heads, no matter how charming a bluff they may put up.

There are no second acts in American lives.

I like France, where everybody thinks he's Napoleon--down here everybody thinks he's Christ.

No matter how low you go, there's always an unexplored basement.

The failure and the success both believe in their hearts that they have accurately balanced points of view, the success because he's succeeded, and the failure because he's failed. The successful man tells his son to profit by his father's good fortune, and the failure tells his son to profit by his father's mistakes.