But we never get back our youth… The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passions of which we were too much afraid, and the exquisite temptations that we had not the courage to yield to.

For the canons of good society are, or should be, the same as the canons of art. Form is absolutely essential to it.

After a good dinner one can forgive anybody, even one's own relations.

All trials are trials for one's life, just as all sentences are sentences of death.

I am not in favour of this modern mania for turning bad people into good people at a moment's notice.

The basis of optimism is sheer terror.

It seems to me that we all look at Nature too much, and live with her too little.