when married people begin to talk about their rights, it means something has gone pretty far wrong between them.

Anyone who pretends not to be interested in money is either a fool or a knave.

I used to do miserably in English literature, which I thought was a sign of moral turpitude. As I look back on it, I think it was rather to my credit. The notion of actually putting writers' words into other words is quite ridiculous because why bother if writers mean what they mean, and if they don't, why read them? There is, I suppose, a case for studying literary works in depth, but I don't quite know what 'in depth' means unless you read a paragraph over and over again.

The fact is, people who don't have any misfortunes are very irritating to their neighbours. No opportunities for popping in with condolences and new-laid eggs. No visits to the afflicted. No opportunities for the milk of human kindness to flow. Naturally it doesn't.

Things you can't understand are always the hardest to bear. To know why is the first step to consolation.

The fact is, for most of us, what happens to ourselves is so much more important than what happens to other people that the smallest mote in our own eye will prevent us from being unduly harrowed by someone else's beam.

there are virtues which are very well in the abstract, but which, encountered in the flesh, can be a source of extreme irritation.