Never invoke the gods unless you really want them to appear. It annoys them very much.

There must be some good in the life of battle, for so many good men have enjoyed being soldiers.

I came to the conclusion that the optimist thought everything good except the pessimist, and that the pessimist thought everything bad, except himself.

Excuse me if I enjoy myself rather obviously! I don't often have the luck to have a dream like this. It is new to me for a nightmare to lead me to a lobster. It is commonly the other way.

You've got that eternal idiotic idea that if anarchy came it would come from the poor. Why should it? The poor have been rebels, but they have never been anarchists; they have more interest than any one else in there being some decent government. The poor man really has a stake in the country. The rich man hasn't; he can go away to New Guinea in a yacht. The poor have sometimes been objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all. Aristocrats were always anarchists, as you can see from the barons' wars.

Puritanism was an honourable mood; it was a noble fad. In other words, it was a highly creditable mistake.

Misers get up early in the morning; and burglars, I am informed, get up the night before.