Virtue and taste are nearly the same, for virtue is little more than active taste, and the most delicate affections of each combine in real love.

One act of beneficence, one act of real usefulness, is worth all the abstract sentiment in the world.

I never trust people's assertions, I always judge of them by their actions.

To a generous mind few circumstances are more afflicting than a discovery of perfidy in those whom we have trusted.

How strange it is, that a fool or knave, with riches, should be treated with more respect by the world, than a good man, or a wise man in poverty!

Such is the inconsistency of real love, that it is always awake to suspicion, however unreasonable; always requiring new assurances from the object of its interest.

There is no accounting for tastes.

When one can hear people moving, one does not so much mind, about one's fears.

There is some comfort in dying surrounded by one's children.

Never will I give my hand where my heart does not accompany it.

Employment is the surest antidote to sorrow.

You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you.

Stop for a moment... let's see what you have skipped!

One listens to one's lawyer prattle on as long as one can stand it and then signs where indicated.

God's Final Message to His Creation: 'We apologize for the inconvenience.

If you do not seek to publish what you have written, then you are not a writer and you never will be.

Public schools are the nurseries of all vice and immorality.

It is astonishing to realise that the human species survived hundreds of thousands of years, more than 99 percent of its time on this planet, with a life expectancy of only eighteen years.

So you treat your love like a firefly, like it only gets to shine for a little while. Catch it in a mason jar, with holes in the top, and run like hell to show it off.

It's important for me to show my children the richness of life and be a role model. I find that my organizational and management skills are tested more at home than at work!