“If politicians and scientists were lazier, how much happier we should all be.”

Aesthetic value is often the by-product of the artist striving to do something else.

One forgets words as one forgets names. One’s vocabulary needs constant fertilizing or it will die.

Manners are especially the need of the plain. The pretty can get away with anything.

If a thing’s worth doing at all, it’s worth doing well.

Punctuality is the virtue of the bored.

O God, if there is a God, forgive him his sins, if there is such a thing as sin.

You have no idea how much nastier I would be if I was not a Catholic. Without supernatural aid I would hardly be a human being.

A work of art is not a matter of thinking beautiful thoughts or experiencing tender emotions , but of intelligence, skill, taste, proportion, knowledge, discipline and industry; especially discipline.

There is something incomparably thrilling in first opening a brand new book.

Words have basic inalienable meanings, departure from which is either conscious metaphor or inexcusable vulgarity.

Don’t hold your parents up to contempt. After all, you are their son, and it is just possible that you may take after them.

To know and love one other human being is the root of all wisdom.

He was gifted with the sly, sharp instinct for self-preservation that passes for wisdom among the rich.

For in that city -New York; there is neurosis in the air which the inhabitants mistake for energy.

What is youth except a man or a woman before it is ready or fit to be seen.

I prefer all but the very worst travel books, to all but the very best novels.

I’m a much happier guy than a lot of people think I am.

Man is happiest when he is creating. In fact, the highest state of which man is capable lies in the creative act.

Talking to a drunk person was like talking to an extremely happy, severely brain-damaged three-year-old.

I have no faith in human perfectibility. I think that human exertion will have no appreciable effect upon humanity. Man is now only more active – not more happy – nor more wise, than he was 6000 years ago.

I just get so happy when I think about the fact that I get to do what I love every day as a job.

Happiness is not to be found in knowledge, but in the acquisition of knowledge.

I used to wonder if it was God’s plan that I should be alone for so much of my life. But I found peace. I found happiness within people and the world

You will never be able to find happiness if you stay attached to the wrong person and don’t move on.