The past was only my cradle, and now it cannot hold me, because I am grown too big.

The czar always got his dues, no matter if it ruined a family.

A little instruction in the elements of chartography—a little practice in the use of the compass and the spirit level, a topographical map of the town common, an excursion with a road map—would have given me a fat round earth in place of my paper ghost.

I have so little mastered the art of tranquil living that wherever I go I trail storm clouds of drama around me.

What we get in steerage is not the refuse, but the sinew and bone of all the nations.

Such creatures of accident are we, liable to a thousand deaths before we are born. But once we are here, we may create our own world, if we choose.

A characteristic thing about the aspiring immigrant is the fact that he is not content to progress alone. Solitary success is imperfect success in his eyes. He must take his family with him as he rises.