I find a fascination, like the fascination for the moth of a star, in those who hold aloof and disdain me.

What pursuit is more elegant than that of collecting the ignominies of our nature and transfixing them for show, each on the bright pin of a polished phrase?

Style is a magic wand, and turns everything to gold that it touches.

But why wasn't I born, alas, in an age of Adjectives; why can one no longer write of silver-shedding Tears and moon-tailed Peacocks, of eloquent Death, of the Negro and star-enameled Night?

The great art of writing is the art of making people real to themselves with words.

I am one of the unpraised, unrewarded millions without whom Statistics would be a bankrupt science. It is we who are born, who marry, who die, in constant ratios.

So, I never lose a sense of the whimsical and perilous charm of daily life, with its meetings and words and accidents.