one of the greatest hindrances to happiness in the present day is our tendency to standardize our conception of it.

Results have nothing at all whatever to do with the private fun of being an author. There lies the answer to the problem which puzzles many wise people. Now it is plain why there are so many of us ... But the public fun of being an author is rather apt to wear thin.

there are - as every one knows - two kinds of writing: one coming out of your vitals and the other from the top of your head. The first is the only sort from which any true private pleasure can be gained, for it is a way of getting something out of life which seemed to be there in childhood, when childhood is quite over.

It is in bed that we learn to bear the inevitable. We are learning this all the time while we lie with our face turned to the wall thinking we are doing nothing.

I suppose there is hardly any one in the civilized world - particularly of those who do just a little more every day than they really have strength to perform - who has not at some time regarded bed as a refuge.

... nothing, of course, is ever so strange as love to the one who is not a lover.

... we condone the most bitter and vindictive intolerance from a desire to appear tolerant, and run to prove that badness is not as bad as it seems, by pointing out that goodness is not so good as it looks.