“There is probably no hell for authors in the next world – they suffer so much from critics and publishers in this.”

What we call conscience in many instances, is only a wholesome fear of the law.

There is great beauty in going through life without anxiety or fear. Half our fears are baseless, and the other half discreditable.

Kindred weaknesses induce friendships as often as kindred virtues.

The heart contracts as the pocket expands.

Hope is the best part of our riches.

Alas, the transports beauty can inspire!

The small courtesies sweeten life; the greater ennoble it.

Four sweet lips, two pure souls, and one undying affection, – these are love’s pretty ingredients for a kiss.

In the assurance of strength there is strength; and they are the weakest, however strong, who have no faith in themselves or their powers.

It is the passion that is in a kiss that gives to it its sweetness; it is the affection in a kiss that sanctifies it.

A book should be luminous not voluminous.

We give our best affections to the beautiful, only our second best to the useful.

Formerly when great fortunes were only made in war, war was a business; but now, when great fortunes are only made by business, business is war.

False friends are like our shadow, keeping close to us while we walk in the sunshine, but leaving us the instant we cross into the shade.

There are seaons when our passions have slept so long that we know not whether they still exist in us. So does flax forget that it is combustible when the fire is away from it.

Life is indeed either a rich possession or a poor, according as it is made subservient to noble aims or ignoble pleasures.

The author of Biographia Literaria was already a ruined man. Sometimes, however, to be a “ruined man” is itself a vocation.

I believe that books, once they are written, have no need of their authors.

Now it is quite clear to me that there are no solid spheres in the heavens, and those that have been devised by the authors to save the appearances, exist only in the imagination.

A scientist’s life, the author says, is indeed conflictual, formed by battles, defeats, and victories: but the adversary is always and only the unknown.

Semi-colons only prove that the author has been to college.

Shakespeare wrote without knowing he would become Shakespeare

The dimensions of a work of art are seldom realized by the author until the work is accomplished. It is like a flowering dream. Ideas grow, budding silently, and there are a thousand illuminations coming day by day as the work progresses.

Once you have lived with another, it is a great torture to have to live alone.