Life was so short, and books so countlessly many.

Cały kłopot z fikcją literacką polega na tym - rzekł John Rivers - że za dużo w niej sensu. W rzeczywistości nigdy nie ma sensu

Every man's memory is his private literature.

It was all extremely symbolic; but then, if you choose to think so, nothing in this world is not symbolical.

Happiness is a hard master, particularly other people's happiness.

My fate cannot be mastered; it can only be collaborated with and thereby, to some extent, directed. Nor am I the captain of my soul; I am only its noisiest passenger.

Proverbs are always platitudes until you have personally experienced the truth of them.

The essay is a literary device for saying almost everything about almost anything

The most distressing thing that can happen to a prophet is to be proved wrong. The next most distressing thing is to be proved right.