There are no perfectly honorable men; but every true man has one main point of honor and a few minor ones.

The more ignorant men are, the more convinced are they that their little parish and their little chapel is an apex to which civilization and philosophy has painfully struggled up the pyramid of time from a desert of savagery.

Men are not governed by justice, but by law or persuasion. When they refuse to be governed by law or persuasion, they have to be governed by force or fraud, or both.

The universal regard for money is the one hopeful fact in our civilization.

Martyrdom is the only path to immortality that requires no talent whatsoever.

Never repeat old grievances.

The hand of the painter is incurably mechanical: his technique is incurably artificial... The camera... is so utterly unmechanical.