One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the peak.

Youth is always too serious, and just now it is too serious about frivolity.

Facts by themselves can often feed the flame of madness, because sanity is a spirit.

If we could destroy custom at a blow and see the stars as a child sees them, we should need no other apocalypse.

The great Gaels of Ireland are the men that God made mad, For all their wars are merry, and all their songs are sad.

Such professions as the soldier and the lawyer ... give ample opportunity for crimes but not much for mere illusions. ... If you have lost a battle you cannot believe you have won it; if your client is hanged you cannot pretend that you have gotten him off.

Humour is meant, in a literal sense, to make game of man; that is, to dethrone him from his official dignity and hunt him like game.