 A man's love, till it has been chastened and fastened by the feeling of duty which marriage brings with it, is instigated mainly by the difficulty of pursuit. |
| Passionate love, I take it, rarely lasts long, and is very troublesome while it does last. Mutual esteem is very much more valuable. |
| There are some achievements which are never done in the presence of those who hear of them. Catching salmon is one, and working all night is another. |
| Poverty, to be picturesque, should be rural. Suburban misery is as hideous as it is pitiable. |
| Marvelous is the power which can be exercised, almost unconsciously, over a company, or an individual, or even upon a crowd by one person gifted with good temper, good digestion, good intellects, and good looks. |
| Never think that you're not good enough. A man should never think that. People will take you very much at your own reckoning. |
| Don't let love interfere with your appetite. It never does with mine. |
| They are best dressed, whose dress no one observes. |
| It is self-evident that at sixty-five a man has done all that he is fit to do. |
| My sweetheart is to me more than a coined hemisphere. |
| They who do not understand that a man may be brought to hope that which of all things is the most grievous to him, have not observed with sufficient closeness the perversity of the human mind. |
| But then in novels the most indifferent hero comes out right at last. Some god comes out of a theatrical cloud and leaves the poor devil ten thousand-a-year and a title. |
| Dance with a girl three times, and if you like the light of her eye and the tone of voice with which she, breathless, answers your little questions about horseflesh and music about affairs masculine and feminine, then take the leap in the dark. |
| I do like a little romance... just a sniff, as I call it, of the rocks and valleys. Of course, bread-and-cheese is the real thing. The rocks and valleys are no good at all, if you haven't got that. |
| Since woman's rights have come up a young woman is better able to fight her own battle. |
| A fellow oughtn't to let his family property go to pieces. |
| Wine is valued by its price, not its flavour. |
| It has now become the doctrine of a large clan of politicians that political honesty is unnecessary, slow, subversive of a man's interests, and incompatible with quick onward movement. |
| Life is so unlike theory. |
| I have no ambition to surprise my reader. Castles with unknown passages are not compatible with my homely muse. |
