To be wrong, and to be carefully wrong, that is the definition of decadence.

When learned men begin to use their reason, then I generally discover that they haven't got any.

Cleanliness is not next to godliness nowadays, for cleanliness is made an essential and godliness is regarded as an offence.

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

Tradition is only democracy extended through time; it may be defined as an extension of the franchise. Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who are merely walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our father.

[There is] one distinctly human thing - the story. There can be as good science about a turnip as about a man. ... [Or philosophy, or theology] ...There can be, without any question at all, as good higher mathematics about a turnip as about a man. But I do not think, though I speak in a manner somewhat tentative, that there could be as good a novel written about a turnip as a man.

But since he stood for England And knew what England means, Unless you give him bacon You must not give him beans.