Life works upon a compensating balance, and the happiness we gain in one direction we lose in another.

Five thousand people in one society might do something, but five thousand societies of one member each would be a holy trouble.

I don't understand German myself. I learned it at school, but forgot every word of it two years after I had left, and have felt much better ever since.

I plodded conscientiously through the twenty-six letters, and the only malady I could conclude I had not got was housemaid's knee.

A glass of wine often makes me a better man than hearing a sermon.

Some people are under the impression that all that is required to make a good fisherman is the ability to tell lies easily and without blushing; but this is a mistake. Mere bald fabrication is useless; the veriest tyro can manage that. It is in the circumstantial detail, the embellishing touches of probability, the general air of scrupulous - almost of pedantic - veracity, that the experienced angler is seen.

It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do.