"I never thought much of the courage of a lion tamer. Inside the cage he is at least safe from people."
"The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and , if they can't find them, make them."
"A lifetime of happiness! No man alive could bear it: it would be hell on earth."
"Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few."
"Anarchism is a game at which the police can beat you."
"Life is no brief candle to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got a hold of for themoment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations."
"We have no more right to consume happiness without producing it than to consume wealth without producing it."
"All my life, affection has been showered upon me, and every forward step I have made has been taken in spite of it."
"The art of government is the organization of idolatry."
"If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas."
"Do not do onto others as you would they should do onto you. Their tastes may not be the same."
"The roulette table pays nobody except him that keeps it. Nevertheless, a passion for gambling is common, though a passion for keeping roulette tables is unknown."
"Man can climb to the highest summits, but he cannot dwell there long."
"The trouble with her is that she lacks the power of conversation but not the power of speech."
"There is only one religion, though there are a hundred versions of it."
"Life is a flame that is always burning itself out, but it catches fire again every time a child is born."
"Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine, and at last you create what you will."
"A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing."
"The popular definition of tragedy is heavy drama in which everyone is killed in the last act, comedy being light drama in which everyone is married in the last act."
"We are ashamed of everything that is real about us; ashamed of ourselves, of our relatives, of our incomes, of our accents, of our opinions, of our experience, just as we are ashamed of our naked skins."
"This is the true joy in life - being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; being a force of nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances."
"Better never than late."
"Baseball has the great advantage over cricket of being sooner ended."
"My specialty is being right when other people are wrong."
"The secret of being miserable is to have the leisure to bother about whether you are happy or not. The cure is occupation."