My father, though, could run very much faster. It was impossible to compete with him on the grass. But it was astonishing how slow old people were. Some of them could not run up a hill and called it trying to climb stairs.

A love for humanity came over me, and watered and fertilised the fields of my inner world which had been lying fallow, and this love of humanity vented itself in a vast compassion.

My first experiences of academic friendship made me smile in after years when I looked back on them. But my circle of acquaintances had gradually grown so large that it was only natural new friendships should grow out of it.

I was a town child, it is true, but that did not prevent me enjoying open-air life, with plants and animals.

Poor is the power of the lead that becomes bullets compared to the power of the hot metal that becomes types.

Being gifted needs courage.

Birth was something that came quite unexpectedly, and afterwards there was one child more in the house.