A grand passion is the privelege of people who have nothing to do.

Behind joy and laughter there may be a temperament, coarse, hard and callous. But behind sorrow there is always sorrow. Pain, unlike pleasure, wears no mask. ... For this reason there is no truth comparable to sorrow. There are times when sorrow seems to me to be the only truth. Other things may be illusions of the eye or the appetite, made to blind the one and cloy the other, but out of sorrow have the worlds been built, and at the birth of a child or a star there is pain.

Greek dress was in its essence inartistic. Nothing should reveal the body but the body.

One has a right to judge a man by the effect he has over his friends.

Wickedness is a myth invented by good people to account for the curious attractiveness of others.

I never read a book I must review; it prejudices you so.

In matters of grave importance, style, not sincerity, is the vital thing.