A man who is a politician at forty is a statesman at three score and ten. It is at this age, when he would be too old to be a clerk or a gardener or a police-court magistrate, that he is ripe to govern a country.

The artist produces for the liberation of his soul. It is his nature to create as it is the nature of water to run down the hill.

I write only when inspiration strikes. Fortunately it strikes every morning at nine o'clock sharp.

Every production of an artist should be the expression of an adventure of his soul.

If truth is a value it is because it is true and not because it is brave to speak it.

Truth is not only stranger than fiction, it is more telling. To know that a thing actually happened gives it a poignancy, touches a chord, which a piece of acknowledged fiction misses. It is to touch this chord that some authors have done everything they could to give you the impression that they are telling the plain truth.

The humorist has a good eye for the humbug; he does not always recognize the saint.