Imagination labors best in distant fields.

How easy it is to make people believe a lie, and [how] hard it is to undo that work again!

Love your enemy, it will scare the hell out of them.

there was no crime in unconscious plagiarism; that I committed it everyday, that he committed it everyday, that every man alive on earth who writes or speaks commits it every day and not merely once or twice but every time he open his mouth… there is nothing of our own in it except some slight change born of our temperament, character, environment, teachings and associations

There are people who think that honesty is always the best policy. This is a superstition. There are times when the appearance of it is worth six of it.

Who are we to create a heaven and hell for ourselves, excluding animals and plants in the bargain, just because we have the power to rationalize?

The proverb says, "Born lucky, always lucky," and I am very superstitious. As a small boy I was notoriously lucky. It was usual for one or two of our lads (per annum) to get drowned in the Mississippi or in Bear Creek, but I was pulled out in a 2/3 drowned condition 9 times before I learned to swim, and was considered to be a cat in disguise.