“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.”

Conversation would be vastly improved by the constant use of four simple words: I do not know.

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.

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

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.