151 Quotes by Sydney Smith

The main question to a novel is -- did it amuse? were you surprised at dinner coming so soon? did you mistake eleven for ten? were you too late to dress? and did you sit up beyond the usual hour? If a novel produces these effects, it is good; if it does not -- story, language, love, scandal itself cannot save it. It is only meant to please; and it must do that or it does nothing.

Madam, I have been looking for a person who disliked gravy all my life; let us swear eternal friendship.

When you rise in the morning, form a resolution to make the day a happy one for a fellow creature.

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.

It is the greatest of all mistakes to do nothing because you can only do little; do something.

The fact is that in order to do anything in this world worth doing, we must not stand shivering on the bank thinking of the cold and the danger, but jump in and scramble through as well as we can.

Thank God for tea! What would the world do without tea! How did it exist? I am glad I was not born before tea.

A man who wishes to make his way in life could do no better than go through the world with a boiling tea-kettle in his hand.