Every one suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues.

No grand idea was ever born in a conference, but a lot of foolish ideas have died there.

The best of America drifts to Paris. The American in Paris is the best American. It is more fun for an intelligent person to live in an intelligent country. France has the only two things toward which we drift as we grow older—intelligence and good manners.

Life is much more successfully looked at from a single window.

Of course all life is a process of breaking down, but the blows that do the dramatic side of the work-- the big sudden blows that come, or seem to come, from outside-- the ones you remember and blame things on and, in moments of weakness, tell your friends about, don't show their effect all at once. There is another sort of blow that comes from within-that you don't feel until it's too late to do anything about it, until you realize with finality that in some regard you will never be as good a man again.

The sign of intelligence is the ability to carry opposed thoughts at the same time.

Every author ought to write every book as if he were going to be beheaded the day he finished it.