“Men who can succeed in deceiving no one else, will succeed at last in deceiving themselves.”

There is no way of writing well and also of writing easily.

I judge a man by his actions with men, much more than by his declarations Godwards.

Till we can become divine, we must be content to be human, lest in our hurry for change we sink to something lower.

When men think much, they can rarely decide.

Of Dickens’ style it is impossible to speak in praise. It is jerky, ungrammatical, and created by himself in defiance of rules…

Success is the necessary misfortune of life, but it is only to the very unfortunate that it comes early.

Of all hatreds that the world produces, a wife’s hatred for her husband, when she does hate him, is the strongest.

Let a man be of what side he may in politics, unless he be much more of a partisan than a patriot, he will think it well that there should be some equity of division in the bestowal of crumbs of comfort.

What on earth could be more luxurious than a sofa, a book, and a cup of coffee?…Was ever anything so civil?

The concrete sound that meets the ears of any outside listener is always a sound of women’s voices?

I never knew a government yet that wanted to do anything.

When the ivy has found its tower, when the delicate creeper has found its strong wall, we know how the parasite plants grow and prosper.

If a cook can’t make soup between two and seven, she can’t make it in a week.

Audacity in wooing is a great virtue, but a man must measure even his virtues.

When it comes to money nobody should give up anything.

I am not fit to marry. I am often cross, and I like my own way, and I have a distaste for men.

We are so used to dissembling with others that in time we come to deceive and dissemble with ourselves.

Few people have the wisdom to prefer the criticism that would do them good, to the praise that deceives them.

Some counterfeits reproduce so very well the truth that it would be a flaw of judgment not to be deceived by them.

And those who do good deeds are deceived, except those who are sincere; and those who are sincere are always in a state of worry.

Nothing is so easy as to deceive oneself; for what we wish, we readily believe.

Nothing is easier than self-deceit.

Nowadays those are rewarded who make right appear wrong.

Nothing is more easy than to deceive one’s self, as our affections are subtle persuaders.