It is in virtue of his own desires and curiosities that any man continues to exist with even patience, that he is charmed by the look of things and people, and that he wakens every morning with a renewed appetite for work and pleasure. Desire and curiosity are the two eyes through which he sees the world in the most enchanted colours...and the man may squander his estate and come to beggary, but if he keeps these two amulets he is still rich in the possibilities of pleasure.
Robert Louis StevensonThere can be no fairer ambition than to excel in talk; to be affable, gay, ready, clear, and welcome.
Robert Louis StevensonA man finds he has been wrong at every stage of his career, only to deduce the astonishing conclusion that he is at last entirely right.
Robert Louis StevensonAs if a man's soul were not too small to begin with, they have dwarfed an narrowed theirs by a life of all work and no play; until here they are at forty, with a listless attention, a mind vacant of all material of amusement, and not one thought to rub against another, while they wait for the train.
Robert Louis StevensonAll sorts of allowances are made for the illusions of youth, and none, or almost none for the disenchantment of age.
Robert Louis Stevenson