The ideas for stories that thronged my brain would not let me rest till I had got rid of them by writing them.

Perhaps the most important use of money - It saves time. Life is so short, and there's so much to do, one can't afford to waste a minute; and just think how much you waste, for instance, in walking from place to place instead of going by bus and in going by bus instead of by taxi.

Unfortunately sometimes one can't do what one thinks is right without making someone else unhappy.

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.

No egoism is so insufferable as that of the Christian with regard to his soul.

Now the answer ... is plain, but it is so unpalatable that most men will not face it. There is no reason for life and life has no meaning.

The value of culture is its effect on character. It avails nothing unless it ennobles and strengthens that. Its use is for life. Its aim is not beauty but goodness.