In England ... education produces no effect whatsoever. If it did, it would prove a serious danger to the upper classes, and would probably lead to acts of violence in Grosvenor Square.

It is only by not paying one's bills that one can hope to live in the memory of the commercial classes.

In examinations the foolish ask questions that the wise cannot answer.

Those who have much are often greedy. Those who have little always share.

It was the passions about whose origin we deceived ourselves that tyrannized most strongly over us.

When a man has once loved a woman he will do anything for her except continue to love her.

Experience was of no ethical value. It was merely the name men gave to their mistakes. Moralists had, as a rule, regarded it as a mode of warning, had claimed for it a certain ethical efficacy in the formation of character, had praised it as something that taught us what to follow and showed us what to avoid. But there was no motive power in experience. It was as little of an active cause as conscience itself. All that it really demonstrated was that our future would be the same as our past, and that the sin we had done once, and with loathing, we would do many times, and with joy.