To be content with life or to live merrily, rather all that is required is that we bestow on all things only a fleeting, superficial glance; the more thoughtful we become the more earnest we grow.

To write brashly about some things, it is almost necessary not to know much about them.

Ambition and suspicion always go together.

Many intelligent people, when about to write . . . , force on their minds a certain notion about style, just as they screw up their faces when they sit for their portraits.

Rational free spirits are the light brigade who go on ahead and reconnoiter the ground which the heavy brigade of the orthodox will eventually occupy.

He marvelled at the fact that the cats had two holes cut in their fur at precisely the spot where their eyes were.

A donkey appears to me like a horse translated into Dutch.