“What is there that confers the noblest delight? What is that which swells a man's breast with pride above that which any other experience can bring to him? Discovery!”

“I have achieved my seventy years in the usual way: by sticking strictly to a scheme of life which would kill anybody else... I will offer here, as a sound maxim, this: That we can't reach old age by another man's road.”

“All publishers are Columbuses. The successful author is their America. The reflection that they-like Columbus-didn't discover what they expected to discover, and didn't discover what they started out to discover, doesn't trouble them. All they remember is that they discovered America; they forget that they started out to discover some patch or corner of India.”

“Ah, if he could only die temporarily!”

“My own luck has been curious all my literary life; I never could tell a lie that anyone would doubt, nor a truth that anybody would believe.”

“I would tell myself that I was about to address the largest mass assembly of idiots ever gathered in the history of mankind.”

“If you want me to speak for two minutes, it will take me three weeks of preparation. If you want me to speak for thirty minutes, it will take me a week to prepare. If you want me to speak for an hour, I am ready now.”

“There is nothing like oratory, it is a skill that can turn a commoner into a king.”

“Lord, I could not endure a husband with a beard on his face! I had rather lie in the woolen.”

“There is no slander in an allowed fool, though he do nothing but rail.”

“I will not be sworn but love may transform me to an oyster”

“Be still prepared for death: and death or life shall thereby be the sweeter.”

“From camp to camp, through the foul womb of night,The hum of either army stilly sounds,That the fixed sentinels almost receiveThe secret whispers of each other's watch.Fire answers fire, and through their play flamesEach battle sees the other's umbered face.Steed threatens steed, in high and boastful neighsPiercing the night's dull ear; and from the tentsThe armorers accomplishing the knights,With busy hammers closing rivets up,Give dreadful note of preparation.”

“To fear the worst oft cures the worst.”

“When the sea was calm all ships alike showed mastership in floating.”

“Well could he ride, and often men would say, "That horse his mettle from his rider takes: Proud of subjection, noble by the sway, What rounds, what bounds, what course, what stop he makes!" And controversy hence a question takes, Whether the horse by him became his deed, Or he his manage by the well-doing steed.”

“Tis an ill cook that cannot lick his own fingers.”