For although this was a very heroic war, with a parade of every sort of high moral principle, and with the most sonorous language employed upon both sides, it somehow failed to bring about either the reformation or the ruin of humankind: and after the conclusion of the murdering and general breakage, the world went on pretty much as it has done after all other wars, with a vague notion that a deal of time and effort had been unprofitably invested, and a conviction that it would be inglorious to say so.

People must have both their dreams and their dinners in this world, and when we go out of it we must take what we find. That is all.

While it is well enough to leave footprints on the sands of time, it is even more important to make sure they point in a commendable direction.

In religious matters a traveller loses nothing by civility.

There is no escaping, at times, the gloomy suspicion that fiddling with pens and ink is, after all, no fit employment for a grown man.

For all men have but a little while to live and none knows his fate thereafter. So that a man possesses nothing certainly save a brief loan of his body: and yet the body of man is capable of much curious pleasure.

There is not any memory with less satisfaction than the memory of some temptation we resisted.