Even when everything seems rotten you can't trust that judgment. It's the sum of all your judgments that counts.

No such thing as a man willing to be honest - that would be like a blind man willing to see.

The world is always curious, and people become valuable merely for their inaccessibility

It was too late - everything was too late. For years now he had dreamed the world away, basing his decisions upon emotions unstable as water.

Riches have never fascinated me, unless combined with the greatest charm or distinction.

I thought of Gatsby's wonder when he first picked out the green light at the end of Daisy's dock. He had come a long way to this lawn and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him. [- Nick Carroway]

Can't repeat the past?" he cried incredulously. "Why of course you can!" He looked around him wildly, as if the past were lurking here in the shadow of his house, just out of reach of his hand.