Old age takes away from us what we have inherited and gives us what we have earned.

The more we feel sorry for ourselves, the less sorry others will feel for us. People don't waste their small store of sympathy on those who can provide it so richly for themselves.

Intellectuals are people who believe that ideas are of more importance than values. That is to say, their own ideas and other people's values.

Those who have money think that the most important thing in the world is love. The poor know it is money.

Wisdom is keeping a sense of fallibility of all our views and opinions.

As Coleridge said, "We receive but what we give." The happy life is a life of continual generosity in which we go out to meet and acclaim the world.

We confess our bad qualities to others out of fear of appearing naive or ridiculous by not being aware of them.