"No man ever believes that the Bible means what it says: He is always convinced that it says what he means."

"I enjoy convalescence. It is the part that makes the illness worth while."

"I was taught when I was young that if people would only love one another all would be well with the world. This seemed simple and very nice but I found when I tried to put it in practice not only that other people were seldom lovable but that I was not very lovable myself."

"If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you."

"The art of government is the organisation of idolatry."

"While we have prisons it matters little which of us occupy the cells."

"A day's work is a day's work neither more nor less and the man who does it needs a day's sustenance a night's repose and due leisure whether he be painter or ploughman."

"Life is no brief candle to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got a hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations."

"Why, except as a means of livelihood, a man should desire to act on the stage when he has the whole world to act in, is not clear to me."

"It is the mark of a truly intelligent person to be moved by statistics."

"Most people do not pray; they only beg."

"The weak may not be admired and hero-worshipped; but they are by no means disliked or shunned; and they never seem to have the least difficulty in marrying people who are too good for them. They may fail in emergencies; but life is not one long emergency: it is mostly a string of situations for which no exceptional strength is needed, and with which even rather weak people can cope if they have a stronger partner to help them out."

"Few people think more than two or three times a year; I have made an international reputation for myself by thinking once or twice a week."

"While we ourselves are the living graves of murdered beasts, how can we expect any ideal conditions on this earth?"

"An asylum for the sane would be empty in America."

"A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing."

"Englishmen never will be slaves they are free to do whatever the Government and public opinion allow them to do."

"A Native American elder once described his own inner struggles in this manner: Inside of me there are two dogs. One of the dogs is mean and evil. The other dog is good. The mean dog fights the good dog all the time. When asked which dog wins, he reflected for a moment and replied, The one I feed the most."

"A pessimist is a man who thinks everybody is as nasty as himself, and hates them for it."

"That is the injustice of a woman's lot. A woman has to bring up her children; and that means to restrain them, to deny them things they want, to set them tasks, to punish them when they do wrong, to do all the unpleasant things. And then the father, who has nothing to do but pet them and spoil them, comes in when all her work is done and stealstheir affection from her."

"I often quote myself. It adds spice to my conversation."

"Peace is not only better than war, but infinitely more arduous."

"Nobody could stand an eternity of Heaven."

"When I was a young man I observed that nine out of ten things I did were failures. I didn't want to be a failure so I did ten times more work."

"Beware of the man who does not return your blow: he neither forgives you nor allows you to forgive yourself."

"Marriage is good enough for the lower classes: they have facilities for desertion that are denied to us."

"Success covers a multitude of blunders."

"I owe all my originality, such as it is, to my determination not to be a literary man. Instead of belonging to a literary club I belong to a municipal council. Instead of drinking and discussing authors and reviews, I sit on committees with capable practical greengrocers and bootmakers... Keep away from books and from men who get their ideas from books, and your own books will always be fresh."

"Fashions after all are only induced epidemics."

"When I was young, I observed that nine out of ten things I did were failures. So I did ten times more work."

"When a thing is funny, search it carefully for a hidden truth."

"Never fret for an only son, the idea of failure will never occur to him."

"If you can't get rid of the skeleton in your closet, you'd best teach it to dance."

"Virtue consists not in abstaining from vice but in not desiring it."

"This is the true joy in life the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one the being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap."

"Self-control is the quality that distinguishes the fittest to survive."

"I believe in the discipline of silence and could talk for hours about it."

"The fickleness of the women I love is only equalled by the infernal constancy of the women who love me."

"Capitalism has destroyed our belief in any effective power but that of self interest backed by force."

"Without art, the crudeness of reality would make the world unbearable."

"If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance."

"You can lose a man like that by your own death but not by his."

"Animals are my friends...and I don't eat my friends."

"Americans adore me and will go on adoring me until I say something nice about them."

"An election is a moral horror, as bad as a battle except for the blood; a mud bath for every soul concerned in it."

"You cannot be a hero without being a coward."

"My method is to take the utmost trouble to find the right thing to say, and then to say it with the utmost levity."

"All my life affection has been showered upon me, and every forward step I have made has been taken in spite of it."

"Socialism is the same as Communism, only better English."

"The man who writes about himself and his own time is the only man who writes about all people and about all time."