Human kindness is like a defective tap, the first gush may be impressive but the stream soon dries up.

It was one of those perfect English autumnal days which occur more frequently in memory than in life.

If our sex life were determined by our first youthful experiments, most of the world would be doomed to celibacy. In no area of human experience are human beings more convinced that something better can be had only if they persevere.

In youth we take egregious risks because death has no reality for us. Youth goes caparisoned in immortality. It is only in middle age that we are shadowed by the awareness of the transitoriness of life.

The secret of contentment is never to allow yourself to want anything which reason tells you you haven't a chance of getting.

What a child doesn't receive he can seldom later give.

Can we ever break free of the devices and desires of our own hearts? Might not our conscience be telling us what we most want to hear?