The [nineteenth-century] young men who were Puritans in politics were anti-Puritans in literature. They were willing to die for the independence of Poland or the Manchester Fenians; and they relaxed their tension by voluptuous reading in Swinburne.

art is at least in part a way of collecting information about the universe.

Unfortunately, all gatherings convened for the betterment of the human lot show a tendency to gas themselves, and not with laughing-gas either.

music is a missionary effort to colonize earth for imperialistic heaven.

All men should have a drop of treason in their veins, if nations are not to go soft like so many sleepy pears.

Why must you always try to be omnipotent, and shove things about? Tragic things happen sometimes that we just have to submit to.

There was a definite process by which one made people into friends, and it involved talking to them and listening to them for hours at a time.