Some people read for instruction, which is praiseworthy, and some for pleasure, which is innocent, but not a few read from habit, and I suppose that this is neither innocent or praiseworthy. Of that lamentable company am I. Conversation after a time bores me, games tire me and my own thoughts, which we are told are the unfailing resource of a sensible man, have a tendency to run dry. Then I fly to my book as the opium-smoker to his pipe.

I would sooner read a time-table or a catalogue than nothing at all. They are much more entertaining than half the novels that are written.

Any society that values wealth above freedom will lose its freedom, and will ultimately lose its wealth as well

I happen to think we’ve set our ideal on the wrong objects; I happen to think that the greatest ideal man can set before himself is self-perfection.

As lovers, the difference between men and women is that women can love all day long, but men only at times.

Reserve is an artificial quality that is developed in most of us but as the result of innumerable rebuffs.

The author always loads his dice, but he must never let the reader see that he has done so.