“Have they defected? They have not gone yet.”

We know our friends by their defects rather than by their merits.

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.

William Gladstone has not a single redeeming defect.

Some people displease with merit, and others’ very faults and defects are pleasing.

The defects of the mind, like those of the face, grow worse with age.

The defects and faults of the mind are like wounds in the body; after all imaginable care has been taken to heal them up, still there will be a scar left behind, and they are in continual danger of breaking the skin and bursting out again.

Weakness of character is the only defect which cannot be amended.

Constant success shows us but one side of the world. For as it surrounds us with friends who will tell us only our merits, so it silences those enemies from whom alone we can learn our defects.