Jane Austen has often been praised as a natural historian. She is a naturalist among tame animals. She does not study men (as Dostoevsky does) in his wild state before he has been domesticated. Her men and women are essentially men and women of the fireside.

There are travelers who fear to own delicate hands more than to meet a lion, and soldiers who would rather lose a limb than gain a beautiful nose by artificial methods.

It is almost impossible to remember how tragic a place the world is when one is playing golf.

This is woman's great benevolence, that she will become a martyr for beauty, so that the world may have pleasure.

We cannot get happiness by striving after it, and yet with an effort we can impart it.

The belief in the possibility of a short decisive war appears to be one of the most ancient and dangerous of human illusions.

We forget that Socrates was famed for wisdom not because he was omniscient but because he realized at the age of seventy that he still knew nothing.