The truest test of independent judgment is being able to dislike someone who admires us, and to admire someone who dislikes us.

A 'penchant for telling the truth' can cripple a candidates chances faster than being caught in flagrante delicto with the governor's wife.

The profound immoralities of our time are cruelty, indifference, injustice and the use of others as means rather than ends in themselves.

Nobody can be so amusingly arrogant as a young man who has just discovered an old idea and thinks it is his own.

The severest test of character is not so much the ability to keep a secret as it is, when the secret is finally out, to refrain from disclosing that you knew it all along.

As we grow older, we should learn that these are two quite different things. Character is something you forge for yourself; temperament is something you are born with and can only slightly modify. Some people have easy temperaments and weak characters; others have difficult temperaments and strong characters. We are all prone to confuse the two in assessing people we associate with. Those with easy temperaments and weak characters are more likable than admirable; those with difficult temperaments and strong characters are more admirable than likable.

Happiness is a direction, not a place.