I was born to love - but none of you wanted to believe it, and that misunderstanding was crucial in forming my character. It's true that nature was strangely inconsistent in giving me a warm heart, but also a face that was like a stone mask and a tongue that was heavy and slow. She refused me what she bestowed freely on even the most loutish of my fellow men. . . . People judged my inner character by my outer covering, and like a sterile fruit, I withered under the rough husk I couldn't slough off.

Charity degrades those who receive it and hardens those who dispense it.

The cigar is the perfect complement to an elegant lifestyle.

[Failure is hard initially because] One knows what one has lost, but not what one may find [and learn from that failure]!

No place is ugly to those who understand the virtues and sweetness of everything that God has made.

Sorrow makes us very good or very bad.

If people were not wicked I should not mind their being stupid; but, to our misfortune, they are both.