There is as much vanity in self-scourgings as in self-justification.

War, for any cause, is inexcusable. There is nothing which excuses us for the beastly ingenuity of our wars. Only fools, only the diseased, think that we are served by killing the strong young men with machines.

... the stomach is near the heart and one appetite pricks on another.

Truth is the only good and the purest pity. ... Men lie for profit or for pity. All lies turn to poison, but a lie that is told for pity or shame breeds such a host of ills that no power on earth can compass their redemption.

No form of art repeats or imitates successfully all that can be said by another; the writer conveys his experience of life along a channel of communication closed to painter, mathematician, musician, film-maker.

Any marriage worth the name is no better than a series of beginnings - many of them abortive.

Critics have been amusing themselves for a long time by auscultating fiction for signs of heart failure.