Men are always optimists when they look inwards, and pessimists when they look around them.

The optimistic nature finds joy in the very feeling for life; the pessimistic nature finds a feeling for life only in joy.

Optimism is denial for chumps with no life experience".
"What's pessimism?" I said.
"Religion without God.

So desperate was Kugel for things to turn out for the best, proclaimed Professor Jove, that he couldn't stop worrying about the worst. Hope, said Professor Jove, was Solomon Kugel's greatest failing.

I will be the first to admit that I am a pessimist by nature. It is, after all, the wisest way to be. We pessimists have everything to gain, whereas optimists have a fifty-fifty chance of being disappointed.

The man who is a pessimist before 48 knows too much; if he is an optimist after it he knows too little.