Human beings cling to their delicious tyrannies and to their exquisite nonsense, till death stares them in the face.

Avoid shame, but do not seek glory; nothing so expensive as glory.

No furniture is so charming as books.

If I were to begin life again, I would devote it to music. It is the only cheap and unpunished rapture upon earth.

Oh, don't tell me of facts, I never believe facts; you know, [George] Canning said nothing was so fallacious as facts, except figures.

When I hear any man talk of an unalterable law, the only effect it produces on me is to convince me that he is an unalterable fool

He who drinks a tumbler of London water has literally in his stomach more animated beings than there are men, women, and children on the face of the globe.