Fine writers should split hairs together, and sit side by side, like friendly apes, to pick the fleas from each others fur.

What I like in a good author isn't what he says, but what he whispers.

It takes a great man to give sound advice tactfully, but a greater to accept it graciously.

Happiness is a wine of the rarest vintage, and seems insipid to a vulgar taste.

All my life, as down an abyss without a bottom. I have been pouring van loads of information into that vacancy of oblivion I call my mind.

The notion of making money by popular work, and then retiring to do good work, is the most familiar of all the devil's traps for artists.