We need two kinds of acquaintances, one to complain to, while to the others we boast.

Eat with the rich, but go to the play with the poor, who are capable of joy.

What is more mortifying than to feel that you have missed the plum for want of courage to shake the tree?

People say that life is the thing, but I prefer reading.

I can't forgive my friends for dying; I don't find these vanishing acts of theirs at all amusing.

Whiskey has killed more men than bullets, but most men would rather be full of whiskey than bullets.

We need new friends; some of us are cannibals who have eaten their old friends up; others must have ever-renewed audiences before whom to re-enact the ideal version of their lives.