“Literature is a splendid mistress, but a bad wife.”

Borrow trouble for yourself, if that’s your nature, but don’t lend it to your neighbours.

A man can never have too much red wine, too many books, or too much ammunition.

Too much work and too much energy kill a man just as effectively as too much assorted vice or too much drink.

Politics are not my concern. They impressed me as a dog’s life without a dog’s decencies.

I always prefer to believe the best of everybody, it saves so much trouble.

A Time For Prayer “In times of war and not before, God and the soldier we adore. But in times of peace and all things righted, God is forgotten and the soldier slighted.” -Rudyard Kipling

He who faces no calamity gains no courage.

There are gems of wondrous brightness Often times lying at our feet, And we pass them, walking thoughtless, Down the busy, crowded street. If we knew, our pace would slacken, We would step more oft with care, Lest our careless feet be treading To the earth some jewel rare.

I have seen something of this world,” she said over the trays, “and there are but two sorts of women in it– those who take the strength out of a man, and those who put it back. Once I was that one, and now I am this.

If you want something and don’t get it, there are only two reasons. You either really didn’t want it, or you tried to bargain over the price.

Cat said, ‘I am not a friend, and I am not a Servant. I am the Cat who walks by himself, and I wish to come into your Cave.’

Cities and Thrones and Powers Stand in Time’s eye, Almost as long as flowers, Which daily die.

In the jungle, life and food depend on keeping your temper.

Delight in the little things.

All the money in the world is no use to a man or his country if he spends it as fast as he makes it. All he has left is his bills and the reputation for being a fool.

For the female of the species is more deadly than the male.

Most men are afraid of a bad name, but few fear their consciences.

There is no book so bad that some good can not be got out of it.

What we do in our group is the opposite of the bad effects of globalization. We produce in Italy and in France and we sell to China, when usually it’s the opposite.

The fishing was good; it was the catching that was bad.

I feel the need to reaffirm all of it, the whole unhappy territory and all the things loved and unloveable in it, for it is all part of me.

I’d rather do something I love badly than to feel bad about not doing something I love.

None love the messenger who brings bad news.

I’m fighting against the bad poet who is prone to using too many words.