You must squeeze out of yourself every sensation, every thought, every image, - mercilessly, without reserve and without remorse: you must search the darkest corners of your heart, the most remote recesses of your brain, - you must search them for the image, for the glamour, for the right expression. And you must do it sincerely, at any cost: you must do it so that at the end of your day's work you should feel exhausted, emptied of every sensation and every thought, with a blank mind and an aching heart, with the notion that there is nothing, - nothing left in you.

The real significance of crime is in its being a breach of faith with the community of mankind.

Give me the right word and the right accent and I will move the world.

Truth of a modest sort I can promise you, and also sincerity. That complete, praiseworthy sincerity which, while it delivers one into the hands of one's enemies, is as likely as not to embroil one with one's friends.

It is my belief no man ever understands quite his own artful dodges to escape from the grim shadow of self knowledge.

Gossip is what no one claims to like, but everybody enjoys.

It is not the clear-sighted who rule the world. Great achievements are accomplished in a blessed, warm fog.