swans ... always look as though they'd just been reading their own fan-mail.

librarianship is one of the few callings in the world for which is it still possible to feel unqualified admiration and respect.

to achieve unity without uniformity is the whole essence of the democratic way of life.

Giving a party is like having a baby: its conception is more fun than its completion; and once you have begun it, it is almost impossible to stop.

A single person is a manageable entity, whom you can either make friends with or leave alone. But half of a married couple is not exactly a whole human being: if the marriage is successful it is something a little more than that; if unsuccessful, a little less. In either case, a fresh complication is added to the already intricate business of friendship: as Clem had once remarked, you might as well try to dance a tarantella with a Siamese twin.

[Gardening] is a means by which you can attain many valuable hours of solitude without being thought unsociable.

It took me forty years on earth To reach this sure conclusion: There is no Heaven but clarity, No Hell except confusion.