To make astute people believe one is what one is not is, in most cases, harder than actually to become what one wishes to appear.

I forget most of what I read, just as I do most of what I have eaten, but I know that both contribute no less to the conservation of my mind and my body on that account.

Just as the performance of the vilest and most wicked deeds requires spirit and talent, so even the greatest demand a certain insensitivity which under other circumstances we would call stupidity.

There can hardly be a stranger commodity in the world than books. Printed by people who don't understand them; sold by people who don't understand them; bound, criticized and read by people who don't understand them; and now even written by people who don't understand them.

The human tendency to regard little things as important has produced very many great things.

To many people virtue consists chiefly in repenting faults, not in avoiding them.

We say that someone occupies an official position, whereas it is the official position that occupies him.