“Growing old is no more than a bad habit which a busy person has no time to form.”

We owe to the Middle Ages the two worst inventions of humanity – romantic love and gunpowder.

Modesty and unselfishness – these are the virtues which men praise – and pass by.

If men could regard the events of their own lives with more open minds, they would frequently discover that they did not really desire the things they failed to obtain.

In literature as in love, we are astonished at what is chosen by others.

A happy marriage is a long conversation which always seems too short.

The really great novel tends to be the exact negative of its author’s life.

Business is a combination of war and sport.

The most important quality in a leader is that of being acknowledged as such. All leaders whose fitness is questioned are clearly lacking in force.

Self-pity comes so naturally to all of us.

To be witty is not enough. One must possess sufficient wit to avoid having too much of it.

An artist must be a reactionary. He has to stand out against the tenor of the age and not go flopping along.

Old age is far more than white hair, wrinkles, the feeling that it is too late and the game finished, that the stage belongs to the rising generations.

The most solid happiness can be shaken by the compassion of a fool.

Memory is a great artist. For every man and for every woman it makes the recollection of his or her life a work of art and an unfaithful record.

If you create an act, you create a habit. If you create a habit, you create a character. If you create a character, you create a destiny.

A marriage without conflicts is almost as inconceivable as a nation without crises.

I have always been more interested in creating a character that contains something crippled. I think nearly all of us have some kind of defect.

Being an outsider at all times is both unhealthy and useful, because you become much more objective about things.

All of us in Parliament now have a responsibility to get on with the process of leaving the EU and securing a more prosperous future for Britain as an open, global, trading nation.

I think growing up the way I did has made me a lot more objective, and that’s important in the process of writing and trying to look at subjective matter that way.

The weak are more likely to make the strong weak than the strong are likely to make the weak strong.

Leaving the European Union really does give us a chance as a country to become more outward-looking, to become more competitive, and to deepen our links with our partners right across the world.

The theory that the man who raises corn does a more important piece of work than the woman who makes it into bread is absurd.

I can get more out of God by believing Him for one minute than by shouting at Him all night.