“I know it is wet and the sun is not sunny, but we can have lots of good fun that is funny.”

“Through three cheese trees three free fleas flew. While these fleas flew, freezy breeze blew. Freezy breeze made these three trees freeze. Freezy trees made these trees' cheese freeze. That's what made these three free fleas sneeze.”

“Adults are just obsolete children and the hell with them.”

“Today was good. Today was fun. Tomorrow is another one.”

“Children's reading and children's thinking are the rock-bottom base upon which this country will rise.”

“Let the reader find that he cannot afford to omit any line of your writing because you you have omitted every word that he can spare.”

“I served with General Washington in die Legislature of Virginia...and...with Doctor Franklin in Congress. I never heard neither of them speak ten minutes at a time, nor to any but the main point.”

“All pleasantry should be short; and it might even be as well were the serious short also.”

“Light boats sail swift, though greater hulks draw deep.”

“No, no, no, no! Come, let's away to prison: We two alone will sing like birds i' the cage: When thou dost ask me blessing, I'll kneel down, And ask of thee forgiveness: so we'll live, And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh At gilded butterflies, and hear poor rogues Talk of court news; and we'll talk with them too, Who loses and who wins; who's in, who's out; And take upon's the mystery of things, As if we were God's spies: and we'll wear out, In a wall'd prison, packs and sects of great ones, That ebb and flow by the moon.”

“More matter with less art.”

“Write till your ink be dry, and with your tearsMoist it again, and frame some feeling lineThat may discover such integrity.”

“It has come to be practically a sort of rule in literature that a man, having once shown himself capable of original writing, is entitled thenceforth to steal from the writings of others at discretion.”

“My book should smell of pines and resound with the hum of insects.”