I never know why self-sacrifice is noble. Why is it better to sacrifice oneself than someone else?

I wonder the human race has been so fond of migrations, when the young take so hardly to traveling.

Truth is so impossible. Something has to be done for it.

The plot is not very important to me, though a novel must have one, of course. It's just a line to hang the washing on.

Dear, dear, the miniature world of the family! All the emotions of mankind seem to find a place in it.

it is in our minds that we live much of our life.

Most of the pleasure of making a book would go if it held nothing to be shared by other people. I would write for a few dozen people, and sometimes it seems that I do so, but I would not write for no-one.