I would rather have five energetic and competent enemies than one fool friend.

How many of us have been attracted to reason; first learned to think, to draw conclusions, to extract a moral from the follies of life, by some dazzling aphorism.

The conscience is the most flexible material in the world. Today you cannot stretch it over a mole hill; while tomorrow it can hide a mountain.

He who writes prose builds his temple to Fame in rubble; he who writes verses builds it in granite.

Genius is but fine observation strengthened by fixity of purpose.

Men are valued, not for what they are, but for what they seem to be.

A fresh mind keeps the body fresh. Take in the ideas of the day, drain off those of yesterday.

A good cigar is as great a comfort to a man as a good cry to a woman.

Punctuality is the stern virtue of men of business, and the graceful courtesy of princes.

Love has no thought of self! Love buys not with the ruthless usurer's gold The loathsome prostitution of a hand Without a heart! Love sacrifices all things To bless the thing it loves!

A fresh mind keeps the body fresh.

What doesn't kill us makes us funnier.

Take a moment think who would actually miss you if you deactivate all your social networking accounts, whatsapp, BBM etc

If you want things to change, then you have to change them.

I just thought that was the most noble contribution you could make to human kind, was to be a teacher.

When you sell a man a book, you don't sell him 12 ounces of paper and ink and glue - you sell him a whole new life.

My wife's not some doobie to be passed around! I took a vow on our wedding day to bogart her for life.

With American Gods I was trying very, very consciously - there was a level at which it was a little like trying to write a novel in French - you know, "this novel is to be written in American."

I knew I was supposed to be a writer; I had made that declaration in the closet of my soul.

The price of reliability is the pursuit of the utmost simplicity. It is a price which the very rich may find hard to pay.

Would there be trees if we didn't see them?