Charles Dickens' creation of Mr. Pickwick did more for the elevation of the human race - I say it in all seriousness - than Cardinal Newman's Lead Kindly Light Amid the Encircling Gloom. Newman only cried out for light in the gloom of a sad world. Dickens gave it.

There is an old motto that runs, "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again." This is nonsense. It ought to read, "If at first you don't succeed, quit, quit at once."

Chess is one long regret.

Being a specialist is one thing, getting a job is another.

The classics are only primitive literature. They belong to the same class as primitive machinery and primitive music and primitive medicine.

Any two meals at a boarding-house are together less than two square meals.

Personally, I would sooner have written Alice in Wonderland than the whole Encyclopedia Britannica.